Can someone explain an aspect of endemic that I’m curious about, please? Can a species become endemic? For example, if something was formerly widespread in the Palaearctic but is now restricted to a mountain range, would it be considered endemic to the mountain range? And if so, does timescale matte…

Have a look at the subtypes of endemism resulting from various palaeobiogeographic events.

That’s a really fascinating perspective/question on the time scale of endemism! The implication is that endemism has both a geography and a time frame as context. Being a relatively short-lived and “new” species on this planet, our human frame of reference for endemism is typically short-sighted, …

In an evolutionary sense, you could speak of endemism in both time and space. This is actually a concept in geology: biostratigraphy determines a rock’s age by the fossils found in them - if you find two rocks with the same fossils, it’s likely they are likely laid down at the same time, because tha…

Thanks for the responses. So according to the Wikipedia article, a species with a restricted distribution that was widespread thousands of years ago is a paleoendemic. One that has been lost from most of its range in historic times may be a cryptoendemic.

Even though endemism is geographical in essence, time is always to be considered, and relatives (…or lack thereof) as well. Palaeoendemics can be loners, “the last of their lineage”; however other endemics (schizo- patro- apo- etc.) are assessed in relation to close coeval taxa.

(moved this to a new topic, from https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/native-vs-endemic-on-inat/43954/ )

The flip side of this question is can a species lose its endemic status through human intervention or natural dispersal? The Knight Anole was endemic to Cuba but is now in Florida and the Bahamas. By some definitions it is still a Cuban endemic. I agree that there is a big temporal aspect to how w…

Yes, of course if it disappears everywhere except in a small part of its old area of distribution. They are called palaeoendemics.

[image] tiwane: (moved this to a new topic, from https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/native-vs-endemic-on-inat/43954/ ) [image] Native vs Endemic on Inat A professor of mine tried to get different language introduced but it never took hold. Endemics and Epidemics of Shibboleths and other thing…

Can a species become endemic over time?

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Can a species become endemic over time?

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