On 30-4-2009 16:37, scott wrote:
>>  Then enter the most powerful natural disaster of them all: Humans.
>>
>>  Thanks to humans the coecalanth is critically endangered
> 
> Why do you think it is because of humans?

An educated guess?

>  Populations of species go up 
> and down pretty violently even without human involvement:
> 
> http://www.geo.arizona.edu/Antevs/nats104/00lect21lynxhare.gif

Such large fluctuations can happen if there is just (effectively) one 
food source that determines survival of the hunter (or vice versa). If 
there are many independent prey animals the curves do not fluctuate as much.

> Does a similar graph for coecalanth exist?

I don't know exactly what the coelacanth eats of what eats it but I 
guess that is not very likely.

A possibly more relevant criticism might be that for a species where we 
don't really know in what habitat it lives it is very hard to estimate 
how many there are and if the number are declining. BTW I can not find 
an estimate for the current population with a superficial google search.

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