This recent Mongabay article highlights research showing how animals play a crucial role in spreading seeds, and, in turn, in addressing the climate crisis.
Across more than 3,000 tropical forest sites, researchers found that forests lacking seed-dispersing animals can store up to four times less carbon than those with healthy wildlife populations.
In fact, 81% of tropical tree species depend on the presence of wild animals, from birds to mammals, to disperse their seeds and maintain healthy, carbon-rich forests that regulate our climate.
Yet deforestation, road construction, hunting, and other human activities are disturbing this delicate balance, linking biodiversity loss to the weakening of nature’s carbon storage capacity.
In other words, when animals disappear, forests lose their ability to regenerate and capture carbon.
Conservation and rewilding efforts, such as creating wildlife corridors, reintroducing seed-dispersing species, and reducing human pressures on wildlife, can help restore these vital ecological connections and strengthen both biodiversity and climate resilience.
Read the Mongabay article: Animals that spread seeds are critical for climate solutions
You can read the article on Mongabay, and it has also been added to the ACC website Resource Library.