This is the great age of cartography, says Lois Parshley’s timely reminder of the importance of understanding landscapes (The long read, 7 February), and mapping everything from sediment-laden ocean floors to patterns of disease outbreaks in earthquake-hit locations.
May I suggest one further task be added to her list. Biodiversity guru EO Wilson predicts we will not complete our census of life on Earth until the 23rd century. To date we have only mapped 20% of all known species, with invertebrates and the “small things” being the most elusive. With habitat loss rampant, we are at risk of losing most of our 10m “critters” before they are found, mapped and ecologically analysed. And if nature gets too thin on the ground, scientists predict, it will fail to deliver the clean air, clean water, food and shelter that we need to survive.
Nigel Winser
Chadlington, Oxfordshire
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