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What are the impacts of interspecific hybrids on species conservation?
Member rating: No Rating | Words: | Submitted: Tue Jun 20 2006
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What are the impacts of interspecific hybrids on species conservation? Rates of hybridisation are increasing dramatically worldwide because of human activities such as the translocation of organisms, habitat fragmentation and modification. As a result, many species have faced, or are facing, extinction. However, hybridisation is also a natural process which has long been recognised as playing an important role in the evolution of plants, and recent studies have found that hybridisation has also played an important role in the evolution of animals. Thus, conservationists need to distinguish between species that have arisen through recent, anthropogenic means and those that have arisen through ancient, natural hybridisation. Conservation policies need to protect the latter species, and also reduce rates of anthropomorphic interspecific hybridisation. Humans often translocate organisms and introduce them into new areas, often with catastrophic effects on the native species. This problem is exemplified by the introduction of the ruddy duck Oxyura jamaicencis...
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