Testing the effectiveness of an international conservation agreement: marketplace forensics and CITES caviar trade regulation.

Background: The international wildlife trade is a key threat to biodiversity. Temporal genetic marketplace monitoring can determine if wildlife trade regulation efforts such as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) are succeeding. Protected under CITES effective 1997, sturgeons and paddlefishes, the producers of black caviar, are flagship CITES species.

Patterns of infection of the lizard malaria parasite, Plasmodium floridense, in invasive brown anoles (Anolis sagrei) in Southwestern Florida.

Plasmodium floridense is a saurian malaria parasite common in the Anolis lizards of the northern Caribbean islands and the SE USA. In the latter area, it is found in two native lizards (Sceloporus undulatus and Anolis carolinensis) and in the introduced Anolis sagrei, which is native to Cuba. We measured parasite prevalence and parasitemia in the introduced anole at a single site in North Port, Florida over 5 years.