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Re: Fp. robertsoni
In numerous posts, I continue to hear reasonings and conclusions that a
species has become extinct because the pond in which it was discovered...or
at one time collected, has been destroyed. An additional commonly stated
conclusion is that a species is extinct because one or another pond,
usually the one next to the road, has dried up and no fish were found this
year.
These conclusions appear to ignore some basic principles of population
biology, particularly the fact that for a population to be stable and self
sustaining it must be of a reasonable size and dispersion to be able to
survive temporary setbacks, particularly to small portions of the total
population. Hence, if the population is so small and restricted that
elimination of one pond leads to extinction, it was doomed already.
Sometime in the next 500 years an exceptional drought was going to dry
THAT pond up.
A viable species must have a distribution larger than that pond next to the
road. We need to look a little harder and be prepared to walk a few ( or a
hundred) km into the bush before we proclaim the species to be extinct.
Do the many professional biologists contributing to this list disagree?
"Allen Boatman"
<Allen.Boatman@sdhc. To: Killietalk at aka_org
k12.fl.us> cc:
Sent by: Subject: Fp. robertsoni
owner-killietalk@aka
.org
05/01/02 05:54 AM
Please respond to
killietalk
Roger,
Is the filling in of that Fp. robertsoni pond confirmed? Last I
heard it
was a conclusion reached without substantial evidence. I heard
it was a banana farm, and having some knowledge of bananas, I think there
is some possibility that that pond is still active, and possibly larger
than before, knowing the Musa sp. affinity for irrigation.
Here's hoping we are mistaken, because that is one beautiful fish.
Boat
Mr. Allen M. Boatman
Instructor of Horticulture
Orient Road Jail
Hillsborough County School Districts
Tampa, Florida
(813) 247-8339
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