The Prague Post - Many animal 'geomorphs' under threat, study warns

EUR -
AED 4.172469
AFN 81.226466
ALL 100.310777
AMD 444.244667
ANG 2.03356
AOA 1042.821867
ARS 1220.13733
AUD 1.807145
AWG 2.044748
AZN 1.935661
BAM 1.960237
BBD 2.294213
BDT 138.054564
BGN 1.961833
BHD 0.42777
BIF 3323.851373
BMD 1.135971
BND 1.500396
BOB 7.851771
BRL 6.659749
BSD 1.136282
BTN 97.823546
BWP 15.847869
BYN 3.718549
BYR 22265.033118
BZD 2.282366
CAD 1.575649
CDF 3265.353315
CHF 0.926352
CLF 0.02877
CLP 1104.02802
CNY 8.283619
CNH 8.27647
COP 4864.114557
CRC 583.02471
CUC 1.135971
CUP 30.103234
CVE 111.723203
CZK 25.124845
DJF 201.885227
DKK 7.469696
DOP 70.093827
DZD 149.546094
EGP 58.259952
ERN 17.039566
ETB 147.907835
FJD 2.589451
FKP 0.877892
GBP 0.868347
GEL 3.135724
GGP 0.877892
GHS 17.612667
GIP 0.877892
GMD 81.97757
GNF 9843.413373
GTQ 8.764715
GYD 237.731535
HKD 8.807798
HNL 29.390533
HRK 7.534333
HTG 149.179304
HUF 414.088552
IDR 19109.585272
ILS 4.201662
IMP 0.877892
INR 98.038602
IQD 1485.451499
IRR 47798.30669
ISK 147.251747
JEP 0.877892
JMD 179.590494
JOD 0.805448
JPY 162.999927
KES 147.160836
KGS 98.898799
KHR 4548.356066
KMF 499.314282
KPW 1022.440932
KRW 1648.225426
KWD 0.348815
KYD 0.941553
KZT 586.195075
LAK 24617.850658
LBP 102082.322949
LKR 337.409727
LRD 227.259252
LSL 22.186263
LTL 3.354228
LVL 0.687138
LYD 6.294087
MAD 10.683391
MDL 20.156928
MGA 5200.797548
MKD 63.597766
MMK 2385.165785
MNT 3990.8206
MOP 9.079058
MRU 45.060918
MUR 51.300752
MVR 17.547018
MWK 1971.304559
MXN 23.079983
MYR 5.077285
MZN 72.556916
NAD 22.186263
NGN 1817.358117
NIO 41.816399
NOK 12.110548
NPR 156.935292
NZD 1.95045
OMR 0.437333
PAB 1.135971
PEN 4.235062
PGK 4.652358
PHP 65.146942
PKR 318.897173
PLN 4.333147
PYG 9105.931016
QAR 4.135359
RON 5.052464
RSD 118.877306
RUB 95.882169
RWF 1609.569838
SAR 4.260315
SBD 9.65559
SCR 16.416149
SDG 681.936428
SEK 11.095337
SGD 1.512044
SHP 0.892695
SLE 25.877842
SLL 23820.746739
SOS 647.75997
SRD 41.645037
STD 23512.307787
SVC 9.940167
SYP 14770.008163
SZL 22.186263
THB 38.478429
TJS 12.348911
TMT 3.974862
TND 3.444377
TOP 2.736183
TRY 43.249673
TTD 7.719493
TWD 37.26551
TZS 3032.703706
UAH 46.978735
UGX 4186.088837
USD 1.135971
UYU 49.285695
UZS 14733.852796
VES 84.749525
VND 29279.215196
VUV 142.891608
WST 3.235249
XAF 665.752377
XAG 0.035233
XAU 0.000351
XCD 3.074402
XDR 0.849168
XOF 665.752377
XPF 119.331742
YER 278.736868
ZAR 21.713523
ZMK 10225.106937
ZMW 31.898096
ZWL 365.782223
  • RBGPF

    62.0100

    62.01

    +100%

  • CMSD

    -0.3000

    21.9

    -1.37%

  • BCE

    0.3800

    21.36

    +1.78%

  • JRI

    0.1450

    11.91

    +1.22%

  • BCC

    0.9800

    95.66

    +1.02%

  • NGG

    2.4700

    68.06

    +3.63%

  • RELX

    0.1000

    49.12

    +0.2%

  • GSK

    1.0400

    34.64

    +3%

  • SCS

    -0.0300

    10.18

    -0.29%

  • AZN

    1.4200

    66.29

    +2.14%

  • BTI

    1.0200

    41.57

    +2.45%

  • CMSC

    -0.3500

    21.8

    -1.61%

  • RIO

    1.9900

    56.86

    +3.5%

  • VOD

    0.2800

    8.73

    +3.21%

  • BP

    0.3600

    26.59

    +1.35%

  • RYCEF

    -0.0100

    9.12

    -0.11%

Many animal 'geomorphs' under threat, study warns
Many animal 'geomorphs' under threat, study warns / Photo: Bohumil FISER - AOPK CR/AFP/File

Many animal 'geomorphs' under threat, study warns

More than a quarter of our planet's natural "geomorphs" -- animals such as beavers and hippos that, collectively, can reshape entire landscapes -- are threatened or have shrinking populations, a new study says.

Text size:

The research, by Queen Mary University of London, found the scale of the impact these animals had on habitats -- by building dams, trampling new river courses, excavating earth and other activities -- rivals that caused by major floods.

Yet "more than a quarter (28 percent) of zoogeomorphic species are vulnerable to future population decline or regional or global extinction," the study's authors warned.

Their research, published mid-February, identified more than 600 species of land and freshwater animals that worked to redesign their ecosystems.

While beavers, of dam-building fame, and hippopotamuses and elephants, which in herds can flatten stretches of earth, are the best-known, there are many others -- often overlooked -- that could also be dubbed animal architects.

Among them are Brazilian termites, which have built high mounds connected by tunnels that cover an area larger than Iceland.

Others identified by the researchers included Australian marsupials, South American shrimp, Asian ants, as well as salmon, moles, earthworms and freshwater insects.

"What we tend to do is overlook the smaller animals that are less visible to us. Perhaps they're living underground or they're living underwater, but those animals can be really kind of important as well," one of the authors, Gemma Harvey, told AFP.

- 'Big cumulative effect' -

Harvey, a professor in biogeomorphology and landscape rewilding, said: "People can underestimate the effects of small animals, because individually their effects are small, but collectively they tend to be more abundant in the landscape so they can have a big cumulative effect."

She added that "it's the collective importance of the animals that is being discovered right now".

She noted the study did not look at marine ecosystems, and that "there will be many more animals that have not yet been studied or perhaps not even been discovered yet".

Of the more than 600 species identified in the research, 57 were classed as endangered, vulnerable or near-threatened on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species.

Many others were at risk of declining populations.

"As we lose species from our landscapes, we lose those unique processes" of reshaping the habitats, Harvey said.

And the power these landscaping animals possess is staggering.

Harvey said her team's study estimated that the species they had identified together exerted 76,000 gigajoules of energy each year -- equivalent to that of "hundreds of thousands of extreme floods".

She said much was still unknown about the animals' geomorphing processes and she planned to further her research, notably by factoring in the effects of climate change.

"We're also interested in thinking kind of back in time in the past, about what we've already lost, you know, from our landscapes as species have become extinct or reduced a lot in terms of their population," she said.

V.Nemec--TPP