Conservation status of plants and animals
Introduction
The conservation status of a species is a forecast based on observed trends and likely pressures.How species are assessed
Panels of experts from New Zealand’s scientific community determine a species' conservation status using the following assessments:
- What’s the current population size? This can be the number of breeding adults or the area of occupied habitat.
- How much is the population estimated to rise or fall over either the next three generations or 10 years (whichever is longer)?
- If the population is stable, has it declined in the past?
- Is the population state a result of human-induced effects?
Difference between endangered and threatened
Relationship of NZTCS categories
Endangered species and threatened species are to many people just different ways of describing the same thing—an at-risk plant or animal. In the New Zealand Threat Classification System these terms mean two different things.
- A threatened species is an umbrella term used to describe a range of risk categories.
- An endangered species is one specific risk category.
Threatened
Threatened species have the greatest risk of extinction.
- Nationally Critical: most severely threatened, facing an immediate high risk of extinction.
- Nationally Endangered: facing high risk of extinction in the short term.
- Nationally Vulnerable: facing high risk of extinction in the medium term.
- Nationally Increasing: small but increasing population still facing a risk of extinction in the medium term.
At Risk
At Risk species aren’t considered Threatened, but they could quickly become so if conservation management reduces, if a new threat arises, or declines continue unabated.
- Declining: population declining but still moderately common.
- Recovering: population increasing after previously declining.
- Relict: small population stabilised after declining.
- Naturally Uncommon: naturally small population and therefore susceptible to harmful influences.