Mo Yi Lam
BISC_102
Professor Kiefer
Nov 30th, 2010
Final Paper (Summary of Endangered Species Act)
Endangered Species Act “What is an endangered species?” is a question that needs to be addressed before getting known of endangered species act. An endangered species is a population of organisms which is at risk of becoming extinct due to three possible reasons: it is few in numbers. According to the theory of Exponential Growth Curve proposed by Malthus, a lower population tends to have a lower reproductive rate and thus a higher risk of going extinct; or a species is threatened by changing environment. A species which fail to adapt a new environment by means such as mutation which creates new “fitting” genes tends to have a
Sturgeons have the largest proportion of the second category and wrasses and birds have the largest of the third category. On the other hand, Wrasses have the smallest proportion of the second category and sturgeons have the smallest of the third category.

Graph 3(IUCN Red List, 2010)

Graph 4(From Prof. Kiefer, 2010) Graph 4 above shows the nature of lands all over the world, which can be categorized into predominantly natural (green), partially disturbed (yellow) and human dominated (red). The red areas spread over Asia, Europe and North American, which shows the greatest threat to endangered species and thus a greater need of conservation program. On the other hand, according to a statistic conducted by IUCN on the number of threatened species (critically endangered, endangered and vulnerable) in each country, Ecuador has the largest number of endangered species (2255), followed by other nations such as China, India and United States (around 1000). Thus, endangered species will be concentrated in these regions. Although different endangered species act were activated long time ago, there is still a controversial about the importance of endangered species act. The opposed side argues that conservation efforts are proved to be costly and time-consuming. Resources can be instead invested into economic, technological and societal