Chapter 2 The Need for Conservation
The IUCN Red List of Ecosystems for North America includes several vulnerable and critically declining terrestrial ecosystems that are found in North Carolina (IUCN 2025The assessments take into account indicators evaluated over various time frames, such as past and recent declines in woodland cover, current tree cover trends, predicted future climatic suitability, historical and recent changes in land use intensity, and potential loss of wildlife species linked to the habitat (IUCN 2019) . These broad ecosystems are temperate systems threatened by increasing population density, intense agriculture, deforestation, and climate change (IUCN 2019, Ferrer-Paris et al. 2019). The following macro group ecosystem types are based on the International Vegetation Classification system (Faber-Langendoem et al. 2014) . Overall risk categories for ecosystem types that occur in North Carolina and assessed to be at-risk include critically endangered (CR), endangered (EN), vulnerable (VU), and near threatened (NT) (IUCN 2024) .
• Pond-cypress - Slash Pine Swamp (NT) • Longleaf Pine woodlands (VU) • Southern Mesic Mixed Broadleaf forests (VU) • Southern Floodplain Hardwood Forest (VU)
• Southern Coastal Plain Basin Swamp and Flatwoods (VU) • South-Central Oak-Hardwood and Pine forests (EN) • Appalachian and Northeastern Oak - Hardwood and Pine Forest (EN) • Central Interior and Appalachian Floodplain Forest (EN) • Southern Coastal Plain Evergreen Hardwood and Conifer Swamp (EN) • Central and Appalachian Swamp Forest (CR)
According to a recent report on the status of biodiversity in the United States (NatureServe 2023) , about 41% of the ecosystems are at risk of range-wide collapse because of an extensive number of threats. The report notes that while tropical ecosystems represent a relatively small proportion of landscapes, they have the highest risk of loss, largely from land-cover change. Temperate ecosystems cover a much larger percentage of the United States and are equally at- risk. For example, more than half of the nation’s grassland ecosystems are considered at risk of range-wide collapse (NatureServe 2023) . The report also indicates the largest number of imperiled plant and wildlife species are concentrated in southeastern and western states. According to the report, the US ecosystems most at risk of range-wide collapse are grasslands (51%) and forests and wetlands (40%). For North Carolina, the report shows between 23% and 46% of the state’s ecosystems are at-risk of loss (NatureServe 2023) . A study by the Natural Areas Association Science Advisory Committee (Noss et al. 2024) notes that since European settlement, 51 species and 14 subspecies of vascular plants are now extinct in the continental United States and Canada (Knapp et al. 2021, Noss et al. 2024) . The study recommends
2025 NC Wildlife Action Plan
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