Help celebrate the International Day for Biological
Diversity. The focus for 2014 is Island Biodiversity.
Here are some interesting facts and figures about the importance of island biodiversity:
Headlines:
"One third of the world’s countries are islands"
"Islands constitute less than 5% of the Earth's landmass; yet, islands provide habitat for 20% of all bird, reptile and plant species"
"Islands also harbour more than 50% of the world’s known
marine biodiversity"
"Islands have higher extinction rates then mainland areas due
to the vulnerability of their endemic flora and fauna, combined with intensive
human use of islands"
"64% of all recorded extinctions in the last century happened
on islands"
Find
out more about International Day for Biological Diversity 2014!
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) came
into effect in 1993, and the UK is one of the 193 countries who have ratified
this convention. All
parties to the Convention are encouraged to celebrate and raise awareness of
the issues facing our biodiversity and for the UK, Gibraltar is raising
the flag and celebrating this day.
While it may not count as islands in the traditional sense,
a lot of our green spaces in the urban environment act as islands sheltering
species which are often isolated by urban spread.
Why not celebrate the biodiversity that we see in our campus
“islands” this today.
Here are a few which we have seen or know to be on our “islands”:
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Penrhyn Road: Common
frog - Rana temporaria
|
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| Tolworth Court Esperia sulphurella |
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Knights Park and Middle Mill: Eels Anguilla anguilla
|
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Kingston Hill: Bees J
|
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Roehampton Vale: Fungi species
|
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Dorich House: Fruit trees in flower
|
If you spot or have spotted anything out and about today,
why not share the images with us and email me at biodiversity@kingston.ac.uk. If
we get enough entries I will do a roundup of the best images and post them in
another blog soon J
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