Stitching Together Forests Can Help Save Species, Study Finds
“But we wanted to take that data and figure out what we’d actually gain by putting these forests back together.”
In the stretch of Atlantic Forest north of Rio de Janeiro, home to the endangered golden lion tamarin, a bright orange primate, the researchers
identified 20 areas where corridors could be planted — small forests just six-tenths of a mile wide — to reconnect existing habitats.
“We’re already observing golden lion tamarins passing through, which means they’re less likely to be isolated, they can meet tamarins elsewhere,
and local populations are less likely to wink out,” he said.
“We’ve known for a while that fragmentation elevates extinction rates and
that these corridors can help,” said Clinton Jenkins, an ecologist at the Institute for Ecological Research in Brazil and a co-author of the study.
The authors make the case that such corridors would be relatively cheap, costing an estimated
$21 million to $49 million to reconnect fragmented forests in Brazil and Tanzania.