Original story at news.com.au
TIME to step it up, David Attenborough. Eighteen thousand species of plants and animals are discovered each year, but experts at Arizona State University say these efforts need to be strengthened because many species “may not survive the 21st century”.
GALLERY: BRAND NEW ANIMAL SPECIES
Their warning came as they announced “nature’s Oscars” – the top 10 newly discovered species for the year.
This year’s list included a cockroach that glows in the dark, a frog no bigger than a fingernail and a species of monkey recognised by a brilliant blue bare patch on the buttocks, perineum and testicles of adult males.
Brand new species: Lightning Roaches. Since the first discovery of a luminescent cockroach in 1999, more than a dozen species have come to light. Photo: Peter Vrsansk/The International Institute for Species Exploration at Arizona State University
Quentin Wheeler, the director of the university’s International Institute for Species Exploration, said a “NASA-like mission” was needed to discover the estimated 10 million species of plants and animals that remain unknown to science.
“This would lead to discovering countless options for a more sustainable future while securing evidence of the origins of the biosphere,” Wheeler said.
The recently described carnivorous sponge, Chondrocladia lyra. The “harp sponge” is found off the coast of California at depths between 3,300 and 3,500 meters (10,800–11,500 feet). Photo: © MBARI 2012
The chair of the body that selected the top 10, Antonio Valdecasas, said the committee looked for “organisms with unexpected features or size and those found in rare or difficult to reach habitats”.
That’s certainly the case with Lucihormetica luckae, an Ecuadorean cockroach that glows in the dark. So rare that it may even already be extinct (the species was identified by a single specimen collected 70 years ago), the roach is one of more than a dozen similar luminescent varieties discovered since 1999.
You’ll have to dive deep to find Chondrocladia lyra: down past 3000 meters, off the coast of California. This carnivorous sponge, shaped like a harp or lyre, has more than 20 knobbed branches stemming from a central vane, maximising the surface area for the capture of the plankton upon which it feeds.
Snails, slugs and earthworms are the diet staples for Sibon noalamina, a nocturnal resident of western Panama’s highland rainforests. The species has been named the “No to the mine!” snake because its habitat is threatened by an ore mine.
Sibon noalamina is a species of snail-eating snake discovered in 2012 from western Panama. It mimicks the light and dark stripes of the venemous coral snake.
We have social media rather than science to thank for Semachrysa jade. The species was photographed in a park near Malaysia’s capital Kuala Lumpur, and the image posted on Flickr, where it attracted the attention of an American entomologist. Although the lacewing has green colouring, the “jade” in its name actually comes from the name of the entomologist’s daughter.
Scientists discovered seven new botanical species in the littoral forests of eastern Madagascar last year, including Eugenia petrikensis, a green shrub with small magenta flowers that grows as tall as two metres. It is considered to be an endangered species because of the partial destruction of the littoral (coastal) forest in which it grows.
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