An ecoregion-based approach to restoring the world’s intact large mammal assemblages

Assemblages of large mammal species play a disproportionate role in the
structure and composition of natural habitats. Loss of these assemblages
destabilizes natural systems, while their recovery can restore ecological
integrity. Here we take an ecoregion-based approach to identify landscapes
that retain their historically present large mammal assemblages, and map
ecoregions where reintroduction of 1–3 species could restore intact
assemblages. Intact mammal assemblages occur across more than one-third of
the 730 terrestrial ecoregions where large mammals were historically
present, and 22% of these ecoregions retain complete assemblages across
>20% of the ecoregion area. Twenty species, if reintroduced or
allowed to recolonize through improved connectivity, can trigger
restoration of complete assemblages over 54% of the terrestrial realm
(11,116,000 km2). Each of these species have at least two large, intact
habitat areas (>10,000 km2) in a given ecoregion. Timely
integration of recovery efforts for large mammals strengthens area-based
targets being considered under the Convention on Biological Diversity.