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Insects are frequently introduced unknowingly -- like this cricket. © AMNH |
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Introduction means moving a species into a new environment, where there is no evidence that it previously existed. When carefully planned by biologists, an introduction can help a species that is under serious threat in its native habitat establish itself in a new place--typically, an ecologically similar area which the species would not be able to reach on its own. However, an accidental or frivolous species introduction can have disastrous consequences. Alien species (rats, insects, and seeds, for example) are frequently transported unknowingly, or released carelessly into a new environment (as happens with livestock, abandoned pets, and garden plants). This creates intruder populations that can wreak ecological havoc and harm native species.
Reintroduction, on the other hand, also called repatriation, involves moving a species back into a region it once naturally inhabited, but from which it had been extirpated.
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