CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION This report is a celebration of freshwater fishes - and it's a call to action too. Rivers, lakes and wetlands are among the most biodiverse places on earth. They cover less than 1 per cent of the planet's total surface, yet they're home to almost a quarter of all vertebrate species - including over half of all the world's fish species. It's an extraordinary fact: of 35,768 known species of fish, 18,075 - or 51 per cent - live in freshwater1. And more are being discovered all the time. But few people have any idea of the unimaginable diversity that swims below the surface of the world's freshwater ecosystems or how critical these undervalued and overlooked freshwater fishes are to the health of people and nature around the world. The World's Forgotten Fishes page 7