%0 Journal Article
%T Apocalypse Now: Adaptation or Extinction in Extreme Geographies?
%J The Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America - Wiley Online Library
%D 2019
%R https://doi.org/10.1002/bes2.1532
%X Review of Berger, Joel, Extreme conservation: life at the edges of the world. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2018. This is a book about how species might adapt in a warming world. Its setting, as the title implies, is Arctic and high altitude regions, big remote places that retain the fierceness of their wild animals and, paradoxically, the questionable thrill of unadulterated natural resources exploitation. Places like Beringia. Eminent conservation biologist and Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) scientist Joel Berger has penned an important book in which he shares his life journey as a field biologist working to advance species conservation in increasingly fragmented, hot, dry landscapes. He organizes his narrative around three focal species that he has studied for decades for WCS: muskox (Ovibos moschatus), the wild yak (Bos mutus), and saiga antelope (Saiga tatarica). By ¡°focal¡± I mean that these species function as bellwethers of how rapidly our world is changing and of the complex issues faced by species worldwide. Per the IUCN Red List, from a global perspective, the saiga is a ¡°critically endangered¡± species, the yak is ¡°vulnerable,¡± and the muskox is ¡°stable¡± (yet this latter species faces significant challenges). I had expected this book to be as much about Berger as it is about these species, more of a memoir, but it's not. Instead, Berger elucidates through refreshingly candid field accounts and anecdotes the human context of conservation: the socio©\political systems in which these species and others struggle to survive. He highlights the work of others, many of them emerging©\nation scientists whom he has mentored and helped empower, such as Gana Wingard, along with accomplished colleagues with whom he has worked for years on wildlife conservation, such as Rich Reading; Reading and Wingard have successfully saved the Argali, Ovis ammon, from extinction in Mongolia, with Earthwatch Institute and Denver Zoo funding. The book is divided into four parts. Part I, The intersection of continents¡ªBeringia's silent bestiary, focuses on muskox ecology and conservation in circumpolar Arctic and sub©\Arctic regions. Part II, Sentinels of the Tibetan Plateau, discusses yak ecology and conservation in the Himalaya. Part III, Gobi ghosts, Himalayan shadows, features saiga ecology and conservation in the Gobi desert. The concluding bluntly titled section, Part IV, Adapt, move, or die, explores the prognosis for these species and many others. Extreme Conservation's intended audience is general, so the author doesn't include a
%U https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/bes2.1532