Niger Delta Ecosystems: the ERA Handbook

Front matter

THE ERA HANDBOOK TO THE NIGER DELTA (THE HUMAN ECOSYSTEMS OF THE NIGER DELTA)

Environmental Rights Action 1998

Dedicated to Nnah Uabari, shot dead on the 25th October 1993 near Shell Flow Station No. 5, Kokokoro, Ogoni, Rivers State, Nigeria

Prologue

1 PROLOGUE

1.1 THE FIRST EDITION

ERA is constantly asked for information about the Niger Delta, based upon its work in the area since 1993. Thus we are issuing a first edition of the ERA Handbook to the Niger Delta, despite the book's many imperfections. Moreover, although ERA by no means claim to have the last word on the subject of the Niger Delta, we feel we have a duty to make available all the information we have to as wide a public as we can. The aim of the book is two-fold:

First, to enable anyone working in the Niger Delta to become confident about the ecology of the area and to feel able to make objective and scientifically secure judgements about the environmental problems which the area is facing

Second, to present an accurate picture of the area to anyone who is interested in it, for whatever reason, and who is unable to visit.

Please bear with the numerous typographic errors and with the scarcity of illustrations.

1.2 THE ONLINE EDITION

This online edition is dedicated to the late Oronto N.Douglas of Okoroba. He insisted on facilitating the 1993 Niger Delta survey on which the handbook is based; without him, it could never have been achieved.

Oronto qualified in law in Port Harcourt, and was a founder member of ERA. He subsequently studied environmental law as a Chevening Scholar at De Montfort University, Leicester, before returning to Nigeria and becoming well known as a human rights activist in the Delta. Oronto was also a poet.

1.3 ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

A great deal of participatory information was gathered during the ERA surveys of 1993 and 1994. It is hoped that all this will be included as an appendix to the second edition of the book. Meanwhile it is available on request.

1.4 SUPPORT AND ASSISTANCE

Finally, we would like to thank the following individuals and organisations: river-scouts Escort, Brownson, Clarkson and Elegy, Babatunde, Caroline Knight, Marie Bystrom, Dr. Justine Dunn, George Frynas, Liza Gadsby, Sir John Gunston, Phil and Frances Hall, Dr. Miriam Isoun, Ronnie Siakor, Prof. Turner Isoun, Tasso Leventis, Dr. Forbes McLean, Bronwen Mamby, Judy Nwonodi, Dr. Julian Caldecott, Chidi Odinkalu, Osas Osas, Laura Robinson, Chief and Mrs. S.T. Owei, County Biomoni, Goodnews Barabura, Alan Daniel, Joseph Onwukwen, Chief Fabian Ndine, Gibson Beke, Bari Kumbe, Oliver Ogbopina, Emmaneul Bonny, The West Brothers, Doris Douglas, Sammy Boy, Friends of the Earth International, The Netherlands Committee of the International Union of Nature Conservation, Pro-Natural International and many others.

1.5 THE MAPS

1.6 THE FIGURES

• | Fig I | Some Root Forms | 22

• | Fig II | Propagules | 23

• | Fig III | Tidal Step | 24

• | Fig IIIA | Sand Barrier Islands | 25

• | Fig IV | Fresh-water Landscape | 26

• | Fig V | Idealised Soil Profile | 27

• | Fig VI | Accumulation of Oil | 28

• | Fig VII | Diagram of an Oil Well | 29

Introduction

2 INTRODUCTION

What is ERA?

The Era Philosophy

ERA Knowledge is Based upon Participatory Research

What is Participatory Research?

2.1 WHAT IS ERA?

Environmental Rights Action, or ERA, is a non-governmental organisation founded in 1993 as an arm of the Nigerian Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO).

The organisation is dedicated to the defence of human ecosystems in terms of human rights, and to the promotion of environmentally responsible governmental, commercial, community and individual practice in Nigeria through the empowerment of Local People.

It describes itself as having two purposes:

to act as a peaceful pressure group, campaigning for change in the policies of governmental, non-governmental and commercial organisations where those policies are likely to act against environmental human rights

to enable Local People to defend their Environmental Human Rights in law.

2.2 THE ERA PHILOSOPHY

2.2.1 THE SEVEN BELIEFS

ERA is bound together and guided by a philosophy which avoids moral ambiguity when approaching problems of human ecology. This philosophy is not a rigid dogma, but a guide based upon the seven beliefs described below.

Environmental Rights are Human Rights

Article 24 of the African Charter of Human and Peoples' Rights states that:

All people shall have the right to (a) generally satisfactory environment favourable to their development.

ERA believes that a respect for all forms of life is an essential foundation to human happiness.

In other words, a genuine concern for humankind and our habitat depends upon a respect for other animals and their habitats, and upon recognition of the importance of diversity.

Humankind cannot achieve happiness in a degraded environment; living in harmony with other forms of life (as in some traditional relationships between people and their environment) is in itself a human right. Furthermore, every individual and responsible human being has an equal right to happiness, regardless of his or her wealth.

All Ecosystems are now human ecosystems

This concept is central to the ERA philosophy.

Because of humankind's growing dominance of the Biosphere, all ecosystems are now ultimately human ecosystems. Ecological problems arise when an ecosystem is seen, in ignorance, as something separate from humankind.

Environmental Human Rights Depend upon Conservation

Conservation is the wise use of natural resources with due regard for the rights of as yet unborn generations. The best conservators, with the most practical and genuine interest in the future of the local environment, will be Local People.

Conservation is best achieved through sustainable 30

Development and Participation

This was articulated in Agenda 21 of the 1992 Earth Summit. The Summit brought together more heads of government than any previous meeting in history, to focus world attention on environmental issues - the most critical issues we face as a global community. Agenda 21 is the global plan of action adopted to address those issues. The real hallmark of the Earth Summit was the emphasis on broad public participation, and the success of Agenda 21 depends on the continued participation of the public in decisions that affect their lives, both nationally and internationally.

Agenda 21 states that sustainable development is the way to reverse both poverty and environmental destruction. Achieving this will demand broad public participation in policy development, combined with greater accountability; individuals, groups and organisations need to know about, and participate in, environment and development issues affecting their communities.

Thus ERA agrees that:

Sustainable Development

Participation + Wealth + Knowledge

Empowerment of Local People

Conservation

Wealth creation without local knowledge and participation does not equal sustainable development. If Local People are kept ignorant and unable to participate in or benefit from the creation of wealth, environmental degradation will result. Poor people may even directly damage the environment, if they cannot afford to think about tomorrow. Sustainable development of local communities, involving the elimination of absolute poverty and of gross income inequity, is therefore vital to any real conservation.

Local People must be empowered for this to succeed

ERA believes this is the key to sustainable development and conservation. ERA aims to achieve this through the establishment of Community Resource Centres (CRCs). These are initiated with the help of NGOs, but are ultimately maintained by the communities themselves. Once established, a good CRC will be a focus for the accumulation and use of knowledge, and for the creation of wealth. It may also enable the community to attract any available aid funding and help. CRCs can become centres of innovation, but essentially they are places where community members (as individuals or as groupings) can empower themselves with knowledge and access the tools of communication to make things happen.

'Local People' may of course include immigrants, if they define themselves as local and see their future and that of their children as being bound up with the locality.

Local Interests must have Primacy

People living in a locality have an investment in its long-term future. Outsiders, whether in government or non-government agencies, are more likely to be interested in short and medium-term considerations.

Outside interests may have rights that must be taken into consideration. However, local interests are more likely than any others to be concerned about genuine conservation and must take priority when decisions are being made.

Fair Trade means transparency

ERA believes that sustainable development and equitable wealth creation depends upon Fair Trade. Local producers must receive a fair price for their products in relation to final market prices; for this to happen, they must be more closely linked to those markets and have knowledge of them.

2.2.2 ERA IS A GRASSROOTS ORGANISATION

These seven beliefs are fundamental to ERA's approach to environmental human rights, and explain the importance of ERA as a grass-roots organisation based on:

the Community Resource Centres

individuals who share and can demonstrate a commitment to ERA beliefs

any community, group, non-governmental or non-commercial organisation that shares and can demonstrate a commitment to ERA beliefs.

2.2.3 MEMBERSHIP

ERA is open to membership from all parts of Nigeria. Membership is independent of the centre but cannot be independent of the philosophy.

2.3 ERA KNOWLEDGE IS BASED UPON PARTICIPATORY RESEARCH

We have seen that participation is a right, enshrined by the Earth Summit (to which Nigeria is a signatory). However, it is essential to sustainable development for very practical as well as ideological reasons.

Development projects can only be effective if they are based on true (rather than preconceived) facts, and if the Local People for whom the projects are supposed to be designed are involved in project planning, management and monitoring. The first step is research, and the 'facts' about any situation will only be relevant if the people concerned are involved in their gathering and presentation.

Development without such participation can go terribly wrong. Numerous examples of development projects in the Niger Delta (indeed throughout Nigeria, Africa and the world) have failed because the development process is in the hands of outsiders. However well-meaning, most outside agents eventually leave and have no permanent commitment to places which are not their own. Development processes are more likely to succeed when Local People are in control, because they have to be committed and because they can only blame themselves when things go wrong.

Sustainable development therefore means empowerment. The political and economic empowerment of people in a locality allows them to control development and use its devices (institutional structures, funds, marketing, etc.) themselves, in order to create the local wealth which maintains the institutions of empowerment and the infrastructure needed for further wealth creation.

However, the first stage in any such work is participatory research.

2.4 WHAT IS PARTICIPATORY RESEARCH?

ERA aims to be the voice of Local People, but it can only be their voice if it has their trust and if it speaks their truth. Gathering relevant knowledge comes from throwing off all preconceptions and by a humble immersion into local life.

ERA's approach is necessarily based upon what ERA people are able to do in the field with limited resources. This means getting to know a community by living within it, in order to feel as far as possible what it may be like to be a member of that community. This means sleeping, eating and washing in the same way, and travelling in the same way—whether by bush-taxi and speed-boat or, more likely, by foot and canoe, or piled onto the back of a motor-bike with one or two others. There are no guarantees, but this is the best way to win trust and friendship and, with luck, to get at the truth of a situation.

This approach to getting local knowledge seems to be dangerously informal, despite having the formal name of 'Participatory Research' or PR. Nonetheless, the process has a respectable academic history and ERA workers approach it seriously.

PR is based upon Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA). In the jargon of the rural development profession this began as Rapid Rural Appraisal (RRA), and the approach has been well justified in relation to work on the environment by David Atte when he was Senior Lecturer in Geography at the University of Ilorin. He wrote:

... rural communities in Africa and other parts of the third world have a profound and detailed knowledge of the ecosystem and species (the natural environment) which they are in contact with, and cultural settings within their respective environments. The dimensions of the knowledge are wide, encompassing the whole range of human experiences with regard to both tangible and non-tangible entities. Their fields of knowledge include history, linguistics, economics, social knowledge, politics and administration; energy related technology; (the) physical environment of soils, water and climate; biological entities of plants, crops, weeds, pests, domestic and wild animals, medicines, taxonomic systems, time, skills, artefacts, religion and a host of others. In all these fields, each rural group has developed knowledge encompassing theory, concepts, inter-relationships, factual and attributive information to a high degree of accuracy. (David Atte, 1989)

This applies equally to urban communities, and Atte further summarises PRA activities as

... both an attitude and a methodology. It provides the mind-set which enables the outsider (usually the elite) to interact with insiders (usually Local People) as equals and for mutual benefit. It helps outsiders to understand the ... community systems by using (the) visual techniques of diagrams, models, counting and quantifying devices, as well as techniques of direct observation, participation and discussion. When Local People partake in these activities and thus help to analyse their own systems (which is usually not done in a formalised way), a two-way learning process is enhanced. This process empowers Local People to take charge of their own situations and negotiate with outsiders from a position of strength and confidence. (Atte, as above)

From ERA's own experience, the process of PR has five advantages in developing relationships with the communities with which it works. They are that:

PR builds up trust between ERA workers (often outsiders) and a Community

Especially as the results of PR describe the community as something valuable, special and unique.

PR helps a community to articulate its own experience and ideas, and synthesise them into coherent and visible knowledge

Recognising the worth and power of this knowledge can in itself be a part of community empowerment.

Well-documented PR provides a sound stock of knowledge for ERA

This gives credibility to its observations.

Subsequent activities based upon information gained by PR are more likely to be relevant to local communities and thus have a better chance of being accepted and successful in local terms.

Where people have already made a direct investment of time and ideas into a project, they will also be more committed to its success.

Above all, PR enables the community to have a platform upon which it can make its voice heard

And heard by a wide audience and especially by those agencies which, for better or worse, may wish to influence it.

In summary, PR involves no more than surveyors divesting themselves of preconceptions, living with local communities and listening to them. This is the essence of Participatory Research; It is the Essence of ERA methodology.

What is the Environment?

3 WHAT IS THE ENVIRONMENT?

Defining Ecology and the Environment in Terms of the Human Landscape

Analysing the Landscape

The Human Landscape: Economic Activity and Society

Landscapes are Alive

Ecosystems

Terms used in the Description of Ecosystems

Plants and Animals in Ecosystems

The Dynamics of Ecosystems and Viability

Real Ecology: Human Society

3.1 DEFINING ECOLOGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN TERMS OF THE HUMAN LANDSCAPE

The world in which we live has been shaped by mankind. It is a human landscape. Thus an understanding of our world depends upon an understanding of ecology. After all:

The Human Landscape is a Physical Manifestation of Humanity's Ecological Relationship With Its Environment.

If you have a basic knowledge of geography and biology you will have no trouble in understanding ecology. It is not a difficult or inaccessible science and anyone who takes an interest in their surroundings and tries to understand it, is an Ecologist. A good forester, farmer or planter is an Ecologist. Nonetheless there are a number of definitions and concepts which are central to the ecological debate: they are easy to understand and we all have to know their common names for ease of communication. These will be discussed below.

Ecology is a young science which has developed out of natural history as a result of the need to understand, explain and solve the problems of mankind's increasingly damaging impact on the environment. In essence:

Ecology is the study of relationships between living phenomena in thier environment.

But this begs the question: what is the Environment, which everyone talks so much about?

The Natural Environment is the result of the dynamic relationship between climate, soils, microbes, plants, water, and animals.

That is, of course, the Environment without people, where vegetation is able to reach its state of climax for a given climate. This could be rain-forests on the West African coast, pine forests on the Siberian plain or the lime forest in much of Southern England.

But people have to be brought into the environmental equation. Our unnatural technology significantly influences the development of the climax vegetation or else destroys it altogether. The influence is clear in urban and agricultural landscapes, less obvious in inaccessible forests, which seem to be entirely natural. But even here, mankind has had a significant impact.

However, it is only possible to understand the human impact on the environment if we understand that:

The Natural Environment is what the Environment would be like without people

Only then can we understand how the environment influences the way people live, and how mankind influences the landscape: only then can we understand the dynamic relationship between the two.

3.2 ANALYSING A LANDSCAPE

Looking at any landscape and trying to understand it means analysing its components and understanding why they are there and what they are. Why is that forest there and why does it have special characteristics? Why is that farmland as it is? Why is that town in that position? What is the relationship between the forest and the farms? What will the landscape look like in six months, or in ten, twenty and a hundred year's time?

Analysing a landscape is best approached in eight steps, each being necessary to an understanding of the next.

3.2.1 GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY

This includes altitude, and the global and continental position of a landscape.

In the case of the Niger Delta it is important to realise that it is flat and at sea level. It is made up of sand and silt brought down by the Niger/Benue river system to the Bight of Benin on the West African coast, which is in the tropics. Much of the sand is spread along the continental shelf and thrown back onto the shore by ocean currents to form the characteristic barrier islands.

3.2.2 CLIMATE

This depends on latitude, continental position and altitude, and on both local and regional topography, such as nearby mountains. A knowledge of the climate is essential to an understanding of the Niger Delta, as a Tropical Rainy Climate.

3.2.3 HYDROLOGY AND WATER QUALITY

Natural hydrological characteristics are a function of geology, topography and climate. Thus in any given place at any given time, water may arise either locally, as stored ground water or rain, or from outside as upstream water or downstream tidal pressure. There are the daily tidal variations, in addition to seasonal change: also there are the subtle relationships between fresh and salt-water.

However, the activities of mankind can have a profound influence on the hydrology of an area. For instance a natural forest ecosystem tends to act as a sponge, soaking up water in wet weather and releasing it slowly in dry thus moderating the water supply to a river systems. Where natural forest is removed or substantially transformed this sponge function of the forest—effectively a natural reservoir—is lost so that flooding becomes more frequent in wet weather and river failure in dry. The same process may apply to lakes and to ground water systems.

3.2.4 SOILS

Soil forming processes are a function of geology, topography, climate and hydrology and it is important to stress that soils are the unique expression of these predetermining factors.

Thus, for instance, a soil formed on the tropical coast, on alluvial deposits, will have quite different characteristics from a soil formed on the same latitude, with the same rainfall patterns, on a hillside at an altitude of 500m. Moreover, it will have different characteristics from a coastal soil formed on alluvial deposits in the temperate zone.

A soil map of the Niger Delta would show a complex series of soils, the common feature being that they are all the result of a tropical rainy climate. This ensures that they tend to be either highly leached and eroded (where there is free drainage), or arising from rapid rates of deposition and subject to water-logging (for instance the peat swamp soils and the mangrove soils). Moreover in certain conditions—river terraces for instance—soil formation is subject to a dynamic combination of both these activities.

Within this general climatic condition soils are differentiated both regionally and locally by geology and by topographical features.

It is important to remember that soils are alive so that their characteristic are as dependent on microbiotic life forms, such as fungi and bacteria, as they are upon water, mineral particles and humus.

3.2.5 VEGETATION

Natural vegetation climaxes are determined by soil conditions.

If the soil conditions are themselves understood in terms of their relationship to geology, topography, climate and hydrology, then there is no need to go beyond soil conditions in order to understand vegetation climaxes. This must be stressed, because too often vegetation is described purely in terms of "Latitude, Altitude and Climate." This is not sufficient for ecological purposes: the soil must be understood first.

Thus the natural vegetation climaxes are as varied as the soils that determine them.

In terms of plant diversity, the general rule is that the warmer and wetter the climate, the greater the diversity. It is not surprising, therefore, that the Niger Delta has international significance in terms of its importance to the maintenance of global biodiversity.

3.2.6 ANIMAL COMMUNITIES AND HABITATS

Within a given climate, vegetation and hydrology/water quality define animal habitats which in turn determine animal communities. Thus a consideration of animal communities involves an understanding of their habitats, both aquatic and terrestrial (and many animals, it must be remembered, inhabit both).

For the same reason as plants, animal diversity is high in the Niger Delta.

3.2.7 THE DYNAMIC ECOLOGICAL RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SOILS, VEGETATION AND ANIMALS

Soils and climate determine vegetation, but clearly, also, vegetation influences the soil: change the vegetation from forest to plantation and you will thereby change the nature of the soil. The climate, hydrology and vegetation are able to determine what sort of aquatic and terrestrial animal communities live in an area.

Animals also influence vegetation by their eating habits. They influence the soil by the deposition of their waste products on to it, by burrowing into it and, at death, by becoming part of it.

Thus the relationship between soils, vegetation and animals is a complex of cycles. This relationship is particularly obvious in the mangrove forests where we can see soils and communities of plants and animals evolving together on new land.

Vegetation also affects climate. For example rain rolls into the interior of Borneo, the world's third largest island, because it is taken up by the forest vegetation which then releases the water again by evapo-transpiration. This same water falls again further and further inland. Take away the forest and the interior will be much drier.

3.2.8 PEOPLE

The impact of people and of their societies upon the landscape is so pervasive that often, in urban and agricultural landscapes, we forget about the other components altogether. Conversely, when we are in the "bush" (which may seem to city eyes seem wild and natural), we fail to see that the landscape is often as influenced by man as any city or plantation. This very is true of the Niger Delta, where mankind's exploitation of the landscape has influenced most areas. The mangrove forests are perhaps the least cultured part of the landscape, but even they have been influenced by mankind for thousands of years.

3.3 THE HUMAN LANDSCAPE: ECONOMIC ACTIVITY AND SOCIETY

Most landscapes, even those that seem to be entirely natural, are a manifestation of human ecosystems which have arisen out of mankind's dynamic relationship with natural ecosystems. This relationship can also be understood as economic activity because:

NATURAL ECOSYSTEMS X MANKIND = ECONOMIC ACTIVITY.

And mankind's ability to exploit minerals further expands the equation:

(NATURAL ECOSYSTEMS + MINERAL RESOURCES) X MANKIND = ECONOMIC CTIVITY.

The way that mankind organises itself in order to maximise the efficiency of economic activity is manifested in human society because:

ORGANISED ECONOMIC ACTIVITY = SOCIETY.

When we look at a landscape as a picture we see land-uses (e.g. roads, villages, cassava farms, plantations and processing plants) and ecological resources (e.g. rivers, forests, and soil). The picture is not an accident but the result of mankind's economic exploitation of the natural ecosystems for the resources that we need, and the social structure that has developed as a result of this exploitation.

The landscape represents human society's impact upon the environment. An impact which today is potentially more damaging to the ability of ecosystems to continue to provide the resources required of them, because of fast-growing human populations and inappropriate technology.

This is not academic theorising but a reality which must be grasped, especially in terms of efficient integrated, landuse planning which must work with human ecological, economic and social realities, not against them. Thus the present state of the ecological resources and land-uses of any country or region are best understood in terms of:

the natural ecosystems;

human economic impact;

society; and

the resulting human landscape.

3.4 LANDSCAPES ARE ALIVE

Ecology recognises that landscapes are alive. There is a dynamic relationship between their components, so that the landscape is always changing: not for one minute does it stay the same. Thus in ecology, landscapes are classified not just in terms of the components we have described, but in terms of life. The definitions below all refer to life: 'bios' is the ancient Greek for life.

3.4.1 THE BIOSPHERE

That part of the earth in which life occurs: from the bottom of the deepest ocean trench to the heights where the strongest bird can fly.

3.4.2 BIOGEOGRAPHICAL REGIONS

These divide the Biosphere into regions of distinct and characteristic combinations of plants and animals across a gradation of climates. They tend to be divided by oceans, deserts and massive mountain ranges. Ecologists differ on the specific definition of the Biogeographical regions but a useful classification defines eight:

the Nearctic region - North America;

the Neotropical region - South America;

the Palearctic region - Eurasia and N. Africa;

the Afrotropical region;

the Oriental region - India and South East Asia;

the Australasian region;

the Oceanic region; and

the Antarctic.

3.4.3 BIOGEOGRAPHICAL SUB-REGIONS

These define the biogeographical regions in more specific terms and are more closely related to geographic factors such as climate and relative isolation. The Niger Delta is in the West African sub-region, which also includes the Congo river basin and the more humid (southerly) part of the Niger/Benue river basin, as well as all the West African coast the mouth of the Congo.

3.4.4 BIOMES

These are large areas containing characteristic communities of plants and animals. Thus the West African biogeographical sub-region contains both Tropical Rain Forest and savannah biomes.

3.5 ECOSYSTEMS

Ecosystems are what ecologists are really interested in: they describe the mechanics of the landscape.

Technically an Ecosystem is an area within a biome which can be given a physical boundary for convenient ecological study.

Ecosystems tend to be defined in three ways

as places which can be recognised within their general surroundings, such as the levee forest at Okoroba or a shrine forest at Botam-Tai;

as places which are defined by the predominance of one plant species, such as the Rhizophora mangrove forests of Akassa Creek; or

as places which are defined by the territory of one animal, such as the Chimpanzees of Okoroba.

But Ecosystems can be Sub-Divided again and again

Thus, for instance, within the Ecosystem of a forest, one can define sub-Ecosystems according to soils and drainage, and so on to the sub-Ecosystems of individual trees or even of individual leaves.

As with the landscapes they describe, Ecosystems change. They are the dynamic workshops where plant and animal species co-evolve.

3.6 TERMS USED IN THE DESCRIPTION OF ECOSYSTEMS

Now here is some necessary terminology with which you will have to become familiar for a further exploration of ecology.

3.6.1 A NATURAL ECOSYSTEM

An Ecosystem largely determined by the natural environment (e.g. a mangrove creek), as opposed to one that is largely determined by mankind (e.g. an oil-palm plantation), and within which there is a dynamic relationship between living things and the rest of their environment.

3.6.2 AN ECOZONE

An area within a biome that has characteristic Ecosystems, such as the alluvial tropical rainforests of the Niger Delta.

3.6.3 A SUB-ECOZONE

One of the parts into which an ecozone can be broken for the purposes of study, such as a ridge-top cultured forest on Akassa Island.

3.6.4 AN ECOTONE

The transitional zone between one Ecosystem and another, such as the banks of a river.

3.6.5 A SPECIES

All the plant or animal individuals which can successfully reproduce with each other.

3.6.6 SPECIES POPULATION

The number of individuals of a species found in a given area.

3.6.7 SPECIES DIVERSITY

The number of species in a given area.

3.6.8 BIODIVERSITY

Another word for species diversity.

3.6.9 THE EVOLUTION OF SPECIES

The divergence and extinction of species through natural selection.