Visualizing AmphibiaWeb Data with Continuous Cartograms (click here)

by Michelle S. Koo, Vance T. Vredenberg, Joyce Gross, Carol L. Spencer, Tate Tunstall, David B. Wake

Introduction

Visualization is a powerful tool that conservation biologists must harness to not only better understand the patterns of decline themselves but to effectively convey the information. Applying AmphibiaWeb data and those of collaborators to density-equalizing cartograms sheds new light on global amphibian diversity and decline. These new perspectives will hopefully present the data in more intuitive and compelling fashion for scientists and the environmentally-aware public alike....

Amphibians are often the first sign of a healthy ecosystem. But, they are often the first indicators when something is wrong. They live between the land and water and what affects them is also effecting or going to effect others.

An extra appendage or growth of some kind is a fairly obvious indication there are problems besides birth defects.

The records of what should be found in an ecosystem are decades old if not centuries or millennia. We know what we are losing and the loss is faster than the adaptation.