Taronga Zoo Questions from my visit today...
- Thread starter James27
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The 'two animals are the same species if the produce fertile offspring' idea is known as the Biological Species Concept, and is now largely abandoned. In some ways, this is a shame, as it was quite clear cut! Problem is, it just isn't very applicable in the real world (not least, if you want to confirm if something is the same species, you'd have to try cross-breeding them!).
There's now a whole subdivision of biology just dedicated to coming up with new species concepts (as the two hour lecture I once had at Uni would attest!). As I'm sure you're aware, most splits and lumps now are based on DNA analysis (rightly or wrongly).
The whole species/subspecies thing is getting a bit extreme; for example the South American monkey known widely as the douroucouli (genus Aotus) was formerly regarded as a single species with 10 subspecies. Then the "splitters" decided that on chromosonal evidence it is actually 10 separate species, despite the fact that they can interbreed and usually can't be told apart by sight.
In a zoo situation it all becomes a nightmare.
In a zoo situation it all becomes a nightmare.
a nightmare maybe. but is it wrong?
science should recognise differences within a species when it discovers such, without concern for the implications that has on conservation or captive breeding programs. i think the truth is that its not actually black and white at all. many species do not fit snugly into out system of classification because evolution continues and various lifeforms are in various stages of diversification.
and lets not forget all the logical splits that have occurred. the douc langur was once considered one species and three races. i am fortunate enough to have seen all the types in the captive location. what struck me was that the three types were clearly not races. they are distinctly different species. prior to this books had told me the 3 types to be almost identical. because the the illustrations are largely inaccurate. the artist failing to distinguish the clear morphological variations amongst the three types in their renderings. there is much, much more to these species than just the colour of their shanks. so sometimes its a lot clearer than we might think. you'd be surprised how few people are often traveling around looking at animals accross their range and actually noticing the differences.
but still, there is no denying that evolution is complicated. it makes it interesting. as humans we like everything to fit snugly in out ordered little groups. but it doesn't always work that way. there is the existence of "superspecies" and seabirds who literally evolve into another species as you trace their distribution around the globe.
it is complex. but it all makes perfect sense.
how that effects zoos is up to zoos to address on a case by case basis.
science should recognise differences within a species when it discovers such, without concern for the implications that has on conservation or captive breeding programs. i think the truth is that its not actually black and white at all. many species do not fit snugly into out system of classification because evolution continues and various lifeforms are in various stages of diversification.
and lets not forget all the logical splits that have occurred. the douc langur was once considered one species and three races. i am fortunate enough to have seen all the types in the captive location. what struck me was that the three types were clearly not races. they are distinctly different species. prior to this books had told me the 3 types to be almost identical. because the the illustrations are largely inaccurate. the artist failing to distinguish the clear morphological variations amongst the three types in their renderings. there is much, much more to these species than just the colour of their shanks. so sometimes its a lot clearer than we might think. you'd be surprised how few people are often traveling around looking at animals accross their range and actually noticing the differences.
but still, there is no denying that evolution is complicated. it makes it interesting. as humans we like everything to fit snugly in out ordered little groups. but it doesn't always work that way. there is the existence of "superspecies" and seabirds who literally evolve into another species as you trace their distribution around the globe.
it is complex. but it all makes perfect sense.
how that effects zoos is up to zoos to address on a case by case basis.
You metion that humans like everything to fit in ordered little groups. What about humans, I am sure using the definition of different species used now that if it was applied to humans we have many different species not races. I do think some animals where appropriate should be kept different species, but in some instance it has gone to far.
This has come up before - people who try to study it often find that is (not unsurprisingly) a political minefield!
Phoenix's post above pretty much sums up my position. Taxonomy and systematics, like any sciences, are about working towards understanding the truth of the world around us, not understanding the truth as long as it fits with our preconceptions and stopping to look if it doesn't.
And your seabird example is brilliant - at Uni we were shown a wonderful diagram of Herring Gull and Lesser Black-backed Gull subspecies distribution and how they're completely distinct species with effectively no interbreeding in northern Europe but each subtly change as you move either west or east respectively so that when the ranges meet in the north Pacific they're a fully admixing population and you can't separate them. Fascinating quirk of evolutionary biology.
actually its quite the contrary. under trend of reclassification based on genetics, humans are remarkably similar. so much so that most scientists wont even acknowledge racial types as a different subspecies let alone something as preposterous as different species.
its worth remembering that our human species diverged from our last human ancestor just 200,000 years ago. in evolutionary terms we have spread the globe in but a blink of an eye.
to compare us with our closest living ancestor: the differences between the chimpanzee "races" are two to three times bigger than those found in humans. those differences justifies the classification of subspecies status in some animals, yet not in our own. believe it or not, the massive variation seen in humans actually accounts for very little genetically.
just for sake of interest i'd be interested to hear which species divisions yourself and ara feel are too extreme.
absolutely!
If Taronga's male is infertile, he should be moved to Alma Park and a fertile male acquired from overseas asap. Alma's female is post-reproductive, but they're listing for a single male. Mogo, Cairns and Orana all have listings for sun bears, but in the longer term.
torie
Well-Known Member
The female also has reproductive issues. So even swapping males probably wont solve the problems