Nature’s technicians: The amazing ways in which animals maintain our world

The report details how various animal 'guilds'—including predators, browsers, seed dispersers, and pollinators—provide essential services such as carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling, and disease prevention. It emphasizes that abundance is as critical as existence for these functions to operate and highlights the risks of 'empty forests' and degraded biomes. Through case studies of specific animals and global biomes, the document argues for a shift from simple conservation to active species recovery to secure the natural systems supporting human society.

• Predators maintain ecosystem balance through 'trophic cascades' and 'landscapes of fear,' where their presence regulates prey populations and alters herbivore behavior to protect vegetation. For example, the reintroduction of sea otters to the Pacific north-west coastline helped regrow kelp forests by controlling sea urchin populations, which in turn sequestered 92% more carbon.
• Browsers and grazers are essential for plant diversity and carbon storage. In the Serengeti, the recovery of wildebeest populations shifted the ecosystem from a carbon source to a carbon sink that absorbs several million tonnes of CO2 annually by reducing fuel loads and the frequency of wildfires.
• Animal seed dispersers, including elephants and hornbills, are vital for forest regeneration and climate adaptation. Approximately 50% of all plant species rely on animals for seed dispersal, and the loss of these species can reduce a forest's above-ground biomass by up to 6% in some regions.
• Pollinators provide one of the most critical ecosystem services, with nearly 90% of flowering plant species and 75% of food crops relying on them. The global economic value of these services is estimated between US$195 billion and US$657 billion annually.
• Soil engineers, such as dung beetles and digging mammals, improve soil health, water infiltration, and nutrient cycling. In Australia, the loss of medium-sized digging mammals has increased fuel loads and reduced fire resilience in forest and woodland ecosystems.
• Plankton-eaters, specifically whales, drive the 'whale pump' and 'whale conveyor belt,' moving essential nutrients like iron and nitrogen vertically and laterally across oceans to fertilize phytoplankton, which produce 50% of the atmosphere's oxygen.
• Wildlife acts as 'nutrient arteries,' transporting phosphorus and nitrogen across ecosystem boundaries. For instance, Pacific salmon move millions of kilos of phosphorus from the sea to inland forests, while animals in the Amazon move approximately US$900 million worth of phosphorus annually from riparian areas to nutrient-poor forests.
• Wild animals are critical for disease prevention through the 'dilution effect' and by controlling disease vectors. The loss of vultures in India increased human mortality by over 4% and cost the country approximately US$23.4bn in rabies control between 1992 and 2006.
• The report identifies 'empty forests'—habitats that appear intact via satellite but lack large and medium-sized animals—as unhealthy systems that will not retain ecosystem integrity over time.

APA

Timmins, H. L., Stolton, S., Dudley, N., Kinnaird, M., Elliott, W., Momanyi, M., Chaplin-Kramer, B., Dahal, S., Echeverri, A., Elkin, C., Gould, R., & Zhang, J. (2024). Nature’s technicians: The amazing ways in which animals maintain our world. WWF International. https://www.worldwildlife.org/documents/635/8rjbaezrdn_NaturesTechnicians_FINAL_EMBARGOED_17Oct.pdf

Chicago

Timmins, Hannah L., Sue Stolton, Nigel Dudley, Margaret Kinnaird, Wendy Elliott, Marsden Momanyi, Becky Chaplin-Kramer, et al. Nature’s technicians: The amazing ways in which animals maintain our world. WWF International, 2024. https://www.worldwildlife.org/documents/635/8rjbaezrdn_NaturesTechnicians_FINAL_EMBARGOED_17Oct.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{timmins2024natures, author = {Timmins, Hannah L. and Stolton, Sue and Dudley, Nigel and Kinnaird, Margaret and Elliott, Wendy and Momanyi, Marsden and Chaplin-Kramer, Becky and Dahal, Smriti and Echeverri, Alejandra and Elkin, Chantal and Gould, Rachelle and Zhang, Jiaying}, title = {{Nature’s technicians: The amazing ways in which animals maintain our world}}, institution = {WWF International}, year = {2024}, url = {https://www.worldwildlife.org/documents/635/8rjbaezrdn_NaturesTechnicians_FINAL_EMBARGOED_17Oct.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }