@article {7325,
	title = {Death and taxes: the case of the depletion of pearl oyster beds in sixteenth-century Venezuela},
	journal = {Conservation Biology},
	volume = {17},
	number = {4},
	year = {2003},
	note = {PDFABSTRACT ONLY!Times Cited: 1ArticleEnglishCited References Count: 83706km},
	month = {AUG},
	pages = {1013-1023},
	abstract = {Interdisciplinary approaches have been used not only to interpret past patterns of natural resource utilization but also to provide useful tools for conservation biology and resource management. I report here the depletion of the pearl oyster (Pinctada imbricata) beds off the coast of Cubagua, Venezuela, in the sixteenth century and the replacement of the oyster by the turkey-wing mussel (Area zebra). I used historical tax data to conclude that the rapid depletion of this resource was the result not only of overexploitation in a short period of time but also of the ecology of the place used by humans to carry out such activity. Under conditions of ecological stress generated by overexpoloitation, the turkey-wing mussel outcompeted the pearl oyster, thus preventing its recovery. Finally, I propose that the exploitation of the pearl oyster beds directly influenced the demographic, social, and cultural conditions of the indigenous human populations in the Caribbean and, to a certain extent, in Africa.},
	keywords = {bivalvia, conservation, mollusca, pearliculture, pinctada, pteriidae, pterioida, pterioidea},
	url = {<u><Go to ISI>://000184452900014</u>},
	author = {Romero, A.}
}
