The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation
Protecting Little Understood Keystone Species and Their Ecosystems
May 26, 2009
Since the early 1970s the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation has focused on raising awareness of the value of such species as butterflies, bees, freshwater mussels and others. They combine that education and outreach with advocacy and research to help protect endangered invertebrates from extinction.
The Importance of Invertebrates in the Environment
Animals without backbones are key to most healthy ecosystems. From the invertebrates who form coral reefs to the dung beetles helping to keep the environment clean to pollinator species such as bees, the role that these animals without backbones have in maintaining the environment is becoming clearer every day.
Bee Colony Collapse Disorder brought the importance of invertebrates to the forefront for many people. Understanding how many aspects of life rely on pollinator species was the first step.
Now, in addition to bees and butterflies, threats to aquatic invertebrates are being exposed. Ocean acidification is affecting shellfish populations. Coral reefs are dying from a variety of insults.
What the Xerces Society Does for Animals Without Backbones
Founded in the 1971 Robert Michael Pyle and Jo Brewer, and named, very appropriately, after a species of butterfly, the Xerces Blue (Glaucopsyche xerces) that is extinct, the Society began its work of protecting habitat for invertebrates. The goal of the organization is to prevent the extinction of any further invertebrate species.
While butterflies were the first species the organization focused on, the need to raise awareness of the value of all invertebrates has led the Xerces Society to other important projects. Two present areas of great concern for the organization are the status of freshwater mussels, particularly in the Pacific Northwest, and protecting pollinator species in the light of bee colony collapse issues.
Habitat Protection for Endangered Invertebrate Species
In the process of declaring critical habitat for other plant and animal species, the role that endangered invertebrates like the American burying beetle play in these ecosystems is often ignored or incompletely understood. The Xerces Society works with the US federal government to ensure that insects, shellfish and other invertebrates are considered in habitat management decisions.
Xerces Society Educates the Public on Animals Without Backbones
Another important step in protecting bees, butterflies and shellfish, along with other less well-known or well-liked invertebrate species, is ensuring that people understand how the animals without backbones play a role in their local habitats.
The Xerces Society has produced identification and habitat management guidelines that are available to habitat managers and the general public. And the society is actively promoting invertebrate conservation in the media to bring the word to more people.
It has taken the bee colony collapse crisis to bring invertebrate conservation into the public eye. But the work of the Xerces Society over the last 3 decades has laid the foundation for better protection of the animals without backbones, who are an important part of every ecosystem.
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