Correlates of Vertebrate Extinction Risk in Canada

Species status assessments are often hindered by a paucity of demographic, abundance, or distributional data. Although extinction-risk correlates have been identified, their wide applicability may be compromised by differences in the variables examined, modeling technique, and phylogenetic or distributional scale. Here, we apply a common analytical approach to examine 14 possible extinction-risk correlates for mammals, fishes, and birds throughout Canada. Among mammals, risk is positively and strongly correlated with road density and age at maturity for land animals and weakly with body size for sea dwellers. Delayed maturity is of primary importance to predicting risk status in fishes, with small body size of secondary importance in freshwater environments. For birds, road density is the dominant correlate of risk. Logistic regression in a multimodel framework offers an instructive means of identifying risk correlates and of applying them in a practicable, empirically defensible manner, thus enhancing support for species-independent risk criteria.