Herbarium Specimens Reveal Putative Insect Extinction on the Deforested Island of Mangareva (Gambier Archipelago, French Polynesia)
Herbarium Specimens Reveal Putative Insect Extinction on the Deforested Island of Mangareva (Gambier Archipelago, French Polynesia)
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DOI：
10.2984/67.4.6
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发表时间：
2013-10-01
期刊：
影响因子：
0.7
通讯作者：
Hembry, David H.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Hembry, David H.
人类活动预计会导致许多生物在分类学上被忽视的谱系中灭绝;然而，对于没有留下亚化石记录的软体生物来说，实际记录这些灭绝是非常困难的。亚化石和历史记录显示，太平洋岛屿上的腹足类和陆生脊椎动物尤其明显地受到人类活动的灭绝，但人类活动是否导致软体动物、分类学上被忽视的动物（如昆虫）的生物多样性丧失仍不清楚。然而，在专门的植物饲养昆虫留下诊断喂养损害的植物，植物标本加上再调查的努力可能表明潜在的灭绝或灭绝在历史时期。在这里，我报告发现叶矿植物叶下珠wilderi（叶下珠科：Glochidion感觉宽）从芒阿雷瓦岛（甘比尔群岛，法属波利尼西亚）的标本馆标本。这些矿在最近对芒阿雷瓦岛的调查中没有被重新发现，但与今天在波利尼西亚东南部许多其他岛屿上由采叶蛾（鳞翅目：细蛾科）制造的矿相似。据我所知，这是第一份关于芒阿雷瓦岛潜在昆虫灭绝的报告，这个岛屿已经因其人类栖息地破坏和生物多样性丧失的历史而闻名。这一结果表明，标本馆标本可以用来鉴定潜在的灭绝和灭绝的昆虫类群。今后在太平洋岛屿和其他地方进行的生物多样性调查应使用植物标本馆标本作为指南，记录潜在的保护和寻找重新发现稀有分类群。
Human activities are expected to result in extinction of many organisms in taxonomically neglected lineages; however, actually documenting these extinctions is very difficult for soft-bodied organisms that do not leave a subfossil record. Subfossil and historic records reveal that human-induced extinction has been particularly marked for gastropods and terrestrial vertebrates on Pacific islands, but whether human activities resulted in similar biodiversity loss in soft-bodied, taxonomically neglected animals (such as insects) remains unclear. However, in cases in which specialized plant-feeding insects leave diagnostic feeding damage on plants, herbarium specimens coupled with resurvey efforts may indicate potential extinctions or extirpations during historic times. Here, I report the discovery of leaf mines in herbarium specimens of the plant Phyllanthus wilderi (Phyllanthaceae: Glochidion sensu lato) from the island of Mangareva (Gambier Islands, French Polynesia). These mines were not rediscovered in recent surveys on Mangareva but are similar to those made today by leaf-mining moths (Lepidoptera: Gracillariidae) on many other islands in southeastern Polynesia. This is, to the best of my knowledge, the first report of a potential insect extinction from Mangareva, an island already well known for its history of anthropogenic habitat destruction and biodiversity loss. This result indicates that herbarium specimens may be used to identify potentially extinct and extirpated insect taxa. Future biodiversity surveys on Pacific islands and elsewhere should use herbarium specimens as a guide both to documenting potential extinctions and to search for rediscovery of rare taxa.