Among our efforts at the NCBP are the creation of a collection of websites that provide widely and easily accessible information on the full range of species in our state. We aim to go beyond the identification aids provided by field guides and focus more fully on the details of the distribution, life histories, and conservation status of species, particularly as they exist here in North Carolina. We include species that are already popular with the general public, such as butterflies and mammals, but we also give special emphasis to groups, such as moths, dragonflies, and grasshoppers, that are less well understood or appreciated but that nonetheless play critical roles in our native ecosystems. Similarly, we give attention both to the common species that the public is most likely to encounter but also rarely seen species, especially those that are declining and of significant conservation concern. While we give the greatest attention to our native species, we also gather information on the exotic, invasive species that are sweeping across our state and whose impacts on native species and ecosystems is a high priority to assess and, ideally, to counteract.
- For the scientific community, we combine survey data that we ourselves collect with records that we vet submitted by the public and other sources, creating as comprehensive a documentation as we can of the taxonomy, distribution, phenology, and ecology of the state’s species. Obtaining information from a wider (and less grant-dependent) range of observers is particularly important in an age when governmental and institutional sponsorship of biological surveys is undergoing a sharp decline - just when sound, detailed data are more critical for environmental decision-making than ever before.
- For the conservation community, we synthesize these data to assess the risk of extirpation of individual species and recommend conservation actions to reduce these risks. One of our most important goals is to increase the range of species used in assessing conservation priorities, both at the level of individual species and of entire ecosystems. We believe it is common sense that conservation decisions should be driven by the needs of the most diverse groups of species, those that play the largest roles in ecosystem processes, those that are the most sensitive to changes in habitat and landscape integrity and, consequently, those species that are in greatest danger of extinction or extirpation. We do not believe that only a small handful of “charismatic” species – particularly vertebrates and perennial vascular plants – should be considered surrogates or “umbrellas” for the vast majority of organisms that have very different life-histories and adaptational strategies. The usual justification for the use of surrogates – that there is simply too little information on these lesser-known groups for their use in conservation decisions – is one that we particularly hope to dispel. The fact that their inclusion may greatly complicate the process of conservation decision-making is to us simply in keeping with the goal of trying to preserve a very complicated, highly diverse natural world.
- For biology teachers and environmental educators, our websites offer information on the huge number of incredible species and their fantastic life histories and intricate webs of adaptations – co-evolved over hundreds of millions of years – that can be observed right here in North Carolina. These make for fascinating stories in themselves, but also provide detailed and diverse examples concerning the effects of environmental change on ecological relationships and what we can do as both individuals and a society to stop or reverse these trends. We wish to strongly encourage the coming generations that their innate interest in the natural world is not irrelevant in a human-dominated and increasingly artificial world. There is indeed still value in knowing where we came from and how we still exist within a natural world greater than ourselves, a world that we still need for our own survival. (add something about providing resources, programs)
- For the general public, our websites provide a freely available source of information that interested community members themselves have a stake in creating. We strongly believe that public involvement will promote greater awareness and appreciation for biodiversity, as well as a greater understanding of its state, all of which are critical for greater and more informed support for biodiversity conservation. Conversely, we do not think there is any chance our efforts can succeed without achieving a broad base of public support.