15 research outputs found

    The importance of Indigenous Territories for conserving bat diversity across the Amazon biome

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    Indigenous Peoples have shaped and managed vast tracts of the Amazon rainforest for millennia. However, evaluations of how much biodiversity is governed under Indigenous stewardship are scarce. Here, we integrate geospatial data of officially recognized ITs across the Amazon biogeographic boundaries with the distribution range of >200 Amazonian bat species, to: (i) assess the potential contribution of ITs for the conservation of this species -rich mammalian group across the Amazon; (ii) investigate which ITs host the greatest number of bat species; and (iii) analyse how threatened and Data Deficient bat species are distributed within the ITs of the nine Amazonian countries. Twenty-two bat species were found to have >25% of their global distribution range within Amazonian ITs, including many forest-dependent species with restricted distribution ranges and a highly threatened or Data Deficient conservation status. Some particularly diverse ITs were found to harbour over half of the known Amazonian bat species, particularly in transboundary areas in the North-western Amazon. At the national level, the highest number of species with over 25% of their national Amazonian distribution within ITs was found in Peru (145), followed by Brazil (136), Colombia and Ecuador (both with 134). This study reveals the potential role of Indigenous Peoples in Amazonian bat conservation and emphasizes the contribution of their stewardship for maintaining the ecosystems in which some of the most rare and unique bat species are found. (C) 2020 Associacao Brasileira de Ciencia Ecologica e Conservacao. Published by Elsevier B.V.Peer reviewe

    Are sacred caves still safe havens for the endemic bats of Madagascar?

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    Despite conservation discourses in Madagascar increasingly emphasizing the role of customary institutions for wildlife management, we know relatively little about their effectiveness. Here, we used semi-structured interviews with 54 adults in eight villages to investigate whether sacred caves and taboos offer conservation benefits for cave-dwelling bats in and around Tsimanampetsotsa National Park, south-west Madagascar. Although some caves were described as sites of spiritual significance for the local communities, most interviewees (c. 76%) did not recognize their present-day sacred status. Similarly, only 22% of the interviewees recognized taboos inhibiting bat hunting and consumption. Legal protection of bats and caves through protected areas was often more widely acknowledged than customary regulations, although up to 30% of the interviewees reported consumption of bats within their communities. Guano extraction was often tolerated in sacred caves in exchange for economic compensation. This may benefit bat conservation by creating incentives for bat protection, although extraction is often performed through destructive and exploitative practices with little benefit for local communities. In view of these results our study questions the extent to which sacred sites, taboos and protected areas offer protection for bats in Madagascar. These results support previous studies documenting the erosion of customary institutions in Madagascar, including the loss of the spiritual values underpinning sacred sites. Given that many Malagasy bats are cave-dwelling species and that most depend on the customary protection of these sites, it is important to obtain a better understanding of the complex interactions between spiritual practices, taboos and protected areas in sustaining bat diversity.Peer reviewe

    Secondary forest regeneration benefits old-growth specialist bats in a fragmented tropical landscape

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    Tropical forest loss and fragmentation are due to increase in coming decades. Understanding how matrix dynamics, especially secondary forest regrowth, can lessen fragmentation impacts is key to understanding species persistence in modified landscapes. Here, we use a whole-ecosystem fragmentation experiment to investigate how bat assemblages are influenced by the regeneration of the secondary forest matrix. We surveyed bats in continuous forest, forest fragments and secondary forest matrix habitats, similar to 15 and similar to 30 years after forest clearance, to investigate temporal changes in the occupancy and abundance of old-growth specialist and habitat generalist species. The regeneration of the second growth matrix had overall positive effects on the occupancy and abundance of specialists across all sampled habitats. Conversely, effects on generalist species were negligible for forest fragments and negative for secondary forest. Our results show that the conservation potential of secondary forests for reverting faunal declines in fragmented tropical landscapes increases with secondary forest age and that old-growth specialists, which are often of most conservation concern, are the greatest beneficiaries of secondary forest maturation. Our findings emphasize that the transposition of patterns of biodiversity persistence in island ecosystems to fragmented terrestrial settings can be hampered by the dynamic nature of human-dominated landscapes.Peer reviewe

    A global database for metacommunity ecology, integrating species, traits, environment and space

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    The use of functional information in the form of species traits plays an important role in explaining biodiversity patterns and responses to environmental changes. Although relationships between species composition, their traits, and the environment have been extensively studied on a case-by-case basis, results are variable, and it remains unclear how generalizable these relationships are across ecosystems, taxa and spatial scales. To address this gap, we collated 80 datasets from trait-based studies into a global database for metaCommunity Ecology: Species, Traits, Environment and Space; “CESTES”. Each dataset includes four matrices: species community abundances or presences/absences across multiple sites, species trait information, environmental variables and spatial coordinates of the sampling sites. The CESTES database is a live database: it will be maintained and expanded in the future as new datasets become available. By its harmonized structure, and the diversity of ecosystem types, taxonomic groups, and spatial scales it covers, the CESTES database provides an important opportunity for synthetic trait-based research in community ecology

    Robust evidence for bats as reservoir hosts is lacking in most African virus studies : a review and call to optimize sampling and conserve bats

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    DATA ACCESSIBILITY : Data used in this study are available from the Dryad Digital Repository: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.c866t1gcx [222]. Supplementary material is available online [223].Africa experiences frequent emerging disease outbreaks among humans, with bats often proposed as zoonotic pathogen hosts. We comprehensively reviewed virus–bat findings from papers published between 1978 and 2020 to evaluate the evidence that African bats are reservoir and/or bridging hosts for viruses that cause human disease. We present data from 162 papers (of 1322) with original findings on (1) numbers and species of bats sampled across bat families and the continent, (2) how bats were selected for study inclusion, (3) if bats were terminally sampled, (4) what types of ecological data, if any, were recorded and (5) which viruses were detected and with what methodology. We propose a scheme for evaluating presumed virus–host relationships by evidence type and quality, using the contrasting available evidence for Orthoebolavirus versus Orthomarburgvirus as an example. We review the wording in abstracts and discussions of all 162 papers, identifying key framing terms, how these refer to findings, and how they might contribute to people’s beliefs about bats. We discuss the impact of scientific research communication on public perception and emphasize the need for strategies that minimize human–bat conflict and support bat conservation. Finally, we make recommendations for best practices that will improve virological study metadata.Open access funding provided by the Max Planck Society. Bucknell University and, in part, by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health (NIH); the German Academic Exchange Service; the German Research Foundation the Institut Universitaire de France; the South African Research Chair Initiative of the Department of Science and Innovation and administered by the National Research Foundation (NRF) of South Africa; in part, by NSF and National Geographic and Rolex grants.https://royalsocietypublishing.org/journal/rsblam2024Medical VirologyNon

    Roost selection by synanthropic bats in rural Madagascar : what makes non-traditional structures so tempting?

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    Humanised landscapes are causing population declines and even extinctions of wildlife, whereas a limited number of species are adapting to the new niches and resources within these modified habitats. Synanthropy is widespread among many vertebrates and often causes co-habitation conflicts between humans and wildlife species. Bats often roost in anthropogenic structures, and especially in the tropics, mitigation of human-bat conflicts arising from co-habitation is hampered by a paucity of research focusing on roost preferences. We assessed roost selection by bats in villages around Ranomafana National Park, eastern Madagascar. Ten villages were surveyed, with bats occupying 21 of the 180 evaluated buildings. Of those, 17 were public buildings harbouring large molossid colonies. Although beneficial ecosystem services provided by bats are well-known, several cases of colony eviction were noted, mostly due to unwanted co-habitation. Bat preference was driven by the type of building, its height and a lack of fire use by the inhabitants. Colonies were mainly found under metal sheets within large empty chambers, whereas only isolated bats were detected in the roofs of traditional cabins. Temperatures up to 50 degrees C were recorded inside a roost, representing one of the highest temperatures recorded for an African maternity roost. Molossidae bats appear to have found a suitable alternative to their native roosts in hollow, old and tall trees in pristine forests, which are becoming rare in Madagascar. This suggests that human-bat interactions in Madagascar will likely increase alongside rural development and the loss of primary forest habitats. Shifting to modern construction methods while combining traditional techniques with proper roof sealing could prevent the establishment of bat colonies in undesired locations, whereas co-habitation conflicts could alternatively be minimised by reducing direct interaction with humans. In light of our results, we urge caution with bat evictions, and greater attention when introducing modern building practices, often supported by foreign initiatives, to poor rural communities in developing countries.Peer reviewe

    Pest suppression by bats and management strategies to favour it : a global review

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    Fighting insect pests is a major challenge for agriculture worldwide, and biological control and integrated pest management constitute well-recognised, cost-effective ways to prevent and overcome this problem. Bats are important arthropod predators globally and, in recent decades, an increasing number of studies have focused on the role of bats as natural enemies of agricultural pests. This review assesses the state of knowledge of the ecosystem services provided by bats as pest consumers at a global level and provides recommendations that may favour the efficiency of pest predation by bats. Through a systematic review, we assess evidence for predation, the top-down effect of bats on crops and the economic value of ecosystem services these mammals provide, describing the different methodological approaches used in a total of 66 reviewed articles and 18 agroecosystem types. We also provide a list of detailed conservation measures and management recommendations found in the scientific literature that may favour the delivery of this important ecosystem service, including actions aimed at restoring bat populations in agroecosystems. The most frequent recommendations include increasing habitat heterogeneity, providing additional roosts, and implementing laws to protect bats and reduce agrochemical use. However, very little evidence is available on the direct consequences of these practices on bat insectivory in farmland. Additionally, through a second in-depth systematic review of scientific articles focused on bat diet and, as part of the ongoing European Cost Action project CA18107, we provide a complete list of 2308 documented interactions between bat species and their respective insect pest prey. These pertain to 81 bat species belonging to 36 different genera preying upon 760 insect pests from 14 orders in agroecosystems and other habitats such as forest or urban areas. The data set is publicly available and updatable.Peer reviewe

    FragSAD : A database of diversity and species abundance distributions from habitat fragments

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    Habitat destruction is the single greatest anthropogenic threat to biodiversity. Decades of research on this issue have led to the accumulation of hundreds of data sets comparing species assemblages in larger, intact, habitats to smaller, more fragmented, habitats. Despite this, little synthesis or consensus has been achieved, primarily because of non-standardized sampling methodology and analyses of notoriously scale-dependent response variables (i.e., species richness). To be able to compare and contrast the results of habitat fragmentation on species' assemblages, it is necessary to have the underlying data on species abundances and sampling intensity, so that standardization can be achieved. To accomplish this, we systematically searched the literature for studies where abundances of species in assemblages (of any taxa) were sampled from many habitat patches that varied in size. From these, we extracted data from several studies, and contacted authors of studies where appropriate data were collected but not published, giving us 117 studies that compared species assemblages among habitat fragments that varied in area. Less than one-half (41) of studies came from tropical forests of Central and South America, but there were many studies from temperate forests and grasslands from all continents except Antarctica. Fifty-four of the studies were on invertebrates (mostly insects), but there were several studies on plants (15), birds (16), mammals (19), and reptiles and amphibians (13). We also collected qualitative information on the length of time since fragmentation. With data on total and relative abundances (and identities) of species, sampling effort, and affiliated meta-data about the study sites, these data can be used to more definitively test hypotheses about the role of habitat fragmentation in altering patterns of biodiversity. There are no copyright restrictions. Please cite this data paper and the associated Dryad data set if the data are used in publications.Peer reviewe

    CESTES - A global database for metaCommunity Ecology: Species, Traits, Environment and Space

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    CESTES is a global database for metaCommunity Ecology: Species, Traits, Environment and Space. It compiles 80 datasets from trait-based studies. Each dataset includes four matrices: species community abundances or presences/absences across multiple sites, species trait information, environmental variables and spatial coordinates of the sampling sites. CESTES presents a harmonized structure and covers a diversity of ecosystem types (marine, terrestrial, freshwater), taxonomic groups (plants, vertebrates, invertebrates...), geographical regions, and spatial scales. The CESTES database is a live database: it will be maintained and expanded in the future as new datasets become available (https://icestes.github.io/sharedata). A zipped folder called “CESTES.zip” includes two alternative formats for the CESTES database: - a “xCESTES” folder that includes 80 Excel files (one file per dataset), each named according to the following structure: “AuthorPublicationYear.xlsx” - a “rCESTES” folder that includes the CESTES core processed database (comm, traits, envir, coord matrices) as an R list object “CESTES.RData” plus two R scripts, and two metadata tables for data processing and exploration. This “CESTES.zip” folder also includes: - an extended metadata table, “CESTES_metadata.xlsx”, that provides the general metadata information of all the datasets, - a tutorial document, “HOW_TO_SHARE_MY_DATA_FOR_CESTES.pdf”, that explains how to share data for integrating future datasets in the database. A second zipped folder, called "ceste.zip", corresponds to the non-spatial ancillary to CESTES. We provide access to 10 additional datasets that were not completely suitable for the CESTES database, due to the absence of spatial information or insufficient metadata but that were potentially valuable for their three other data matrices (comm, traits, envir). They follow the same structure as CESTES, except that they do not present the “coord” sheet and sometimes include only partial metadata. The “ceste.zip” zipped folder includes the 10 data files + 1 metadata file called "ceste_metadata.xlsx"
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