A systematic review of adaptive wildlife management for the control of invasive, non-native mammals, and other human–wildlife conflicts

1.We are entering an era where species declines are occurring at their fastest ever rate, and the increased spread of non-native species is among the top causes. High uncertainty in biological processes makes the accurate prediction of the outcomes of management interventions very challenging. Adaptive management (AM) offers solutions to reduce uncertainty and improve predictability so that the outcomes of interventions can continuously improve. 2.We quantitatively assess the extent to which AM is used for managing vertebrates, with a focus on invasive non-native species (INNS). Using the Web of Science, we evaluated 3992 articles returned by the search terms ‘adaptive management’ or ‘adaptive harvest management’ against seven recommended elements of AM (engagement with stakeholders, defining objectives, forecasting and estimating uncertainty, implementing management, monitoring populations, adjusting management in response to monitoring, and improving forecasting and reducing uncertainty in response to monitoring populations). 3.The use of AM for vertebrates was reported in 56 (1%) of the evaluated studies; including four for managing INNS. Of these, ten studies excluding INNS and no studies of INNS management implemented all seven recommended elements of AM. Those elements infrequently implemented were: the use of analysis or models to forecast and represent uncertainty (44%) and the feedback of monitoring data to improve forecasting and reduce uncertainty (25%). 4.Complete active AM has rarely been implemented and reported for managing INNS, despite the significant advantages it offers. Among studies purporting to have implemented AM, most did not use analyses or models to forecast and represent uncertainty, while most defined objectives, implemented management, and monitored populations.5.Improvements to ongoing control programmes and much broader adoption of the AM approach are required to increase the efficiency and success of INNS management campaigns and reduce their negative impacts on native species

The changing nature of risk and risk management: the challenge of borders, uncertainty and resilience

No abstract available

Fluctuation induces evolutionary branching in a modeled microbial ecosystem

The impact of environmental fluctuation on species diversity is studied with a model of the evolutionary ecology of microorganisms. We show that environmental fluctuation induces evolutionary branching and assures the consequential coexistence of multiple species. Pairwise invasibility analysis is applied to illustrate the speciation process. We also discuss how fluctuation affects species diversity.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures. Submitted to Physical Review Letter

The ethnoecology of Caiçara metapopulations (Atlantic Forest, Brazil): ecological concepts and questions

The Atlantic Forest is represented on the coast of Brazil by approximately 7,5% of remnants, much of these concentrated on the country's SE coast. Within these southeastern remnants, we still find the coastal Caiçaras who descend from Native Indians and Portuguese Colonizers. The maintenance of such populations, and their existence in spite of the deforestation that occurred on the Atlantic Forest coast, deserves especial attention and analysis. In this study, I address, in particular, the Caiçaras who live on the coast of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro States, illustrating with examples of coastal inhabitants from other areas, such as Bahia State (NE coast) and of other forested areas (riverine caboclos of the Amazon). The major focus of this study, based on previous research, performed since 1986 in several populations or villages of the Atlantic Forest coast, is to understand the resilience of the Caiçaras, which is analyzed using ecological concepts, such as metapopulation, resilience and adaptive cycles. The Caiçara populations are located on islands (Búzios, Comprida, Grande, Ilhabela, Jaguanum, Gipóia) and on the coast (Bertioga, Puruba, Picinguaba, among others). Information gathered about the Caiçaras regarding the economic cycles of the local regions, along with ecological, historical and economic data available, are used to understand such resilience, and are complemented with comparative examples from the Brazilian Amazon and with variables such as the local restrictions imposed by environmental governmental agencies

Panarchy use in environmental science for risk and resilience planning

Environmental sciences have an important role in informing sustainable management of built environments by providing insights about the drivers and potentially negative impacts of global environmental change. Here, we discuss panarchy theory, a multi-scale hierarchical concept that accounts for the dynamism of complex socio-ecological systems, especially for those systems with strong cross-scale feedbacks. The idea of panarchy underlies much of system resilience, focusing on how systems respond to known and unknown threats. Panarchy theory can provide a framework for qualitative and quantitative research and application in the environmental sciences, which can in turn inform the ongoing efforts in sociotechnical resilience thinking and adaptive and transformative approaches to managemen

Networked buffering: a basic mechanism for distributed robustness in complex adaptive systems

A generic mechanism - networked buffering - is proposed for the generation of robust traits in complex systems. It requires two basic conditions to be satisfied: 1) agents are versatile enough to perform more than one single functional role within a system and 2) agents are degenerate, i.e. there exists partial overlap in the functional capabilities of agents. Given these prerequisites, degenerate systems can readily produce a distributed systemic response to local perturbations. Reciprocally, excess resources related to a single function can indirectly support multiple unrelated functions within a degenerate system. In models of genome:proteome mappings for which localized decision-making and modularity of genetic functions are assumed, we verify that such distributed compensatory effects cause enhanced robustness of system traits. The conditions needed for networked buffering to occur are neither demanding nor rare, supporting the conjecture that degeneracy may fundamentally underpin distributed robustness within several biotic and abiotic systems. For instance, networked buffering offers new insights into systems engineering and planning activities that occur under high uncertainty. It may also help explain recent developments in understanding the origins of resilience within complex ecosystems. \ud \u