In the past few centuries, mammals and other animals have been going extinct at least 100 times faster than they did before humans arrived on the scene. Researchers at Michigan State University have found that, when deciding which species need protecting, extinction risk factors of the past can be powerful — but they’re not perfect.
Lydia Beaudrot, assistant professor in the College of Natural Science, explained that identifying the species that are most vulnerable is key to protecting them while there’s still time. But many species are a black box. Some 770 mammal species evaluated by the IUCN — nearly 15% — are considered “data deficient,” meaning scientists just don’t have enough information on their numbers or where they live to determine if they need protecting or not.
To bridge the gaps, scientists sometimes look to large-scale trends over time. But just how well do studies of extinction risk in centuries and millennia gone by predict species’ vulnerability today?