Introduction
Over the past 10000 years of settled agriculture, humans have changed the
Earth's landscape. We have converted forests into farmlands, reclaimed
wetlands for agriculture and planted woodlots in savannas, transforming
natural landscapes into cultural ones. In the process, we have also changed
the habitats of 1.8 million other known species that we share this planet
with (EOL, 2008). However, during this time we have also domesticated many
species by creating new habitats for them. These include a wide variety of
grasses that we use for cereal grains, a number of trees that yield valuable
non-timber forest products and a variety of animals for milk and meat.
Furthermore, in search of useful products, humans have altered the species
composition of the so-called ‘natural’ landscapes. For
example, the Kayapo Indians of the Brazilian Amazon are known to have
maintained Brazil nut groves, altering the species composition of forest
they inhabited (Posey, 1985). Similarly, many indigenous societies across
the world have favoured a variety of other useful species, giving rise to
landscape-scale heterogeneity. In Kebon Tatangkalan agroforests of West
Java, Indonesia, for example, Parikesit et al. (2005)
identified 12 different types of tree assemblages. Such traditional land-use
practices have not only given rise to landscape-scale heterogeneity, but
they have made a contribution to the biocultural diversity of our
planet.
Although domestication has been an important driving force in creating new
habitats for some species, the reasons for conservation of many others may
not just be utilitarian. It can be argued that the origins of biocultural
diversity have as much to do with the veneration of species as with their
usefulness, as the examples below suggest. Near the town of Madurai, in the
Tamilnadu state of India, tree groves provide roosting sites for colonies of
the Indian flying fox (Pteropus giganteus). It is believed
that this bat, which elsewhere is hunted for its body fat, receives
protection because the trees are worshipped by the local people (Marimuthu,
1988).