REDAK RA
Department of Entomology and Center for, Conservation Biology, University of California, Riverside, California 92521, USA
Environ Manage. 2000 Jul;26(S1):S97-S107. doi: 10.1007/s002670010065.
Arthropods constitute well over one-half of the species of higher life on the planet and are the dominant terrestrial life form on the planet. Unfortunately, very little is known about most arthropod species. There are an estimated 163,487 species of insects in North America, of which only 66% are taxonomically known. Similarly, there are an estimated 35,514 species of North American arachnids, of which only 9316 are described; over 73% have yet to be discovered and described. Without the basic taxonomic and life history knowledge for most of the terrestrial species (i.e., arthropods) of North American ecosystems, land managers are faced with the challenge of developing, selecting, and managing biotic reserves and habitat conservation plans for which they know very little about the majority of organisms found within such reserves or covered by such plans. With respect to arthropods, this challenge includes taking into account poorly described species being used as political tools to stop development (as opposed to actually protecting a truly endangered species), thus confounding the habitat conservation planning process and ensuring that "surprises" in the form of new listings will occur within any multispecies habitat plan. Finally, using various scenarios and assumptions, estimates of the true number of endangered insects and arachnids are provided to illustrate the fact that the suspected number of threatened, endangered, and extinct species is probably low by at least an order of magnitude.
节肢动物占地球上高等生物物种的一半以上，是地球上占主导地位的陆地生命形式。不幸的是，对于大多数节肢动物物种，人们了解得非常少。据估计，北美洲有163487种昆虫，其中只有66%在分类学上为人所知。同样，据估计北美洲有35514种蛛形纲动物，其中只有9316种已被描述；超过73%有待发现和描述。由于缺乏北美生态系统中大多数陆地物种（即节肢动物）的基本分类学和生活史知识，土地管理者面临着制定、选择和管理生物保护区及栖息地保护计划的挑战，而他们对这些保护区内或此类计划所涵盖的大多数生物了解甚少。就节肢动物而言，这一挑战包括考虑到一些描述不清的物种被用作阻止开发的政治工具（而不是实际保护真正濒危的物种），从而混淆栖息地保护规划过程，并确保在任何多物种栖息地计划中都会出现新列入物种形式的“意外情况”。最后，通过使用各种情景和假设，对濒危昆虫和蛛形纲动物的真实数量进行了估计，以说明受威胁、濒危和灭绝物种的疑似数量可能至少低一个数量级这一事实。
