The first global assessment of freshwater species across multiple taxonomic groups has revealed that one quarter of the 23,496 freshwater species surveyed by the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species™ are threatened by extinction, in a paper published by Nature.
But the scale of the freshwater biodiversity crisis told in these numbers could overwhelm the story of each species and its fight for survival. We cannot tell 23,496 stories, but we have chosen seven species across the assessment to paint a picture of the creatures behind the statistics, with the help of wildlife illustrator Van Wangye Shiming.
Underworld shrimp (Typhlocaris lethaea)