To increase awareness on biological invasions and support for conservation actions, we want to identify species threatened by biological invasions that would make good flagship species. This would be useful for communication and help people understand the threats of biological invasions.
We aim to survey the general public, so that they can tell us which species matter and appeal most to them among a number of proposed species. We have already generated a selection of species based on conservation biology and culturomics: how strongly they are threatened by biological invasions and how prominent they are on the internet (i.e., the number of Wikipedia visits and number of webpages containing each species’ name). We have also enriched this selection with suggestions by experts in the field of invasions. We consider only tetrapod species (mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians).
Now, we need to reduce the number of species that will be included in the survey to the general public. This is where you come in 🙂 We’d be glad if in the surveys below, you could rate each species based on how good flagships they would be in your opinion, and thus whether it should be included in the final survey or be removed. There are 4 distinct surveys (mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians) that should be considered independent.
For each species, we provide an illustration or a photo, its global IUCN Red List threat category, its distribution, and the « identity » of the invasive alien species threatening it. Feel free to make use of this information in any way you find relevant to score each species.
Here are the links for mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians. Please do all four (it is very quick!).
Thank you very much for your contribution. Please do not hesitate to share among your professional networks (invasion biology experts).
Marwan Naciri, Elena Angulo, Ivan Jarić, Jonathan Jeschke & Franck Courchamp
