Comparative Conservation Biology of Oceanic Archipelagoes: Hawaii and the Galápagos

Oceanic islands have had an important role in the history of evolutionary biology and are continuing to serve as crucial sites for evolutionary studies. The Hawai- ian Islands and the Galipagos Islands are two archipelagoes where much biological investigation has been, and continues to be, performed. Both ar- eas have also received attention be- cause of the vulnerability of their endemic animals and plants to dam- age by humans and organisms intro- duced by humans. The Hawaiian bio- ta has, in general, undergone much more destruction than that of the Galipagos. For example, whereas the Hawaiian archipelago has lost over 75% of its original endemic land bird fauna through prehistoric and histor- ic extinctions (Olson and James 1984, Scott et al., page 238-253 this issue), the Galipagos archipelago as a whole is not known to have lost a single land bird species. Oceanic islands are extremely vul- nerable to certain types of human- related biological invasions because of their long isolation from some of the selective forces that have shaped the evolution of continental orga- nisms. These forces include browsing and trampling by herbivorous mam- mals, predation by ants, virulent dis