Between concepts and experiences: people’s understandings of climate change in southern Ecuador

For decades, researchers have worried about people's understanding of climate change. Although this understanding varies by cultural context, most studies so far have taken place in industrialized countries. Few studies have explored people’s understandings of climate change in the global South. Through standardized questionnaires and semi-structured interviews conducted in southern Ecuador, this paper explores differences between urban and rural dwellers and compares these with farmers’ understandings of the causes, consequences and risks. We found urban and rural dwellers hold a similar understanding to that found in other nations, but articulated in ways that reflect their particular realities. Despite reporting first-hand experience of the agricultural effects of climate change, when prompted, farmers do not link climate change to their own experience. It is thus important to go beyond judging knowledge as correct or incorrect, and instead, incorporate local realities in the climate narrative

Scarecrows and Scapegoats: The Futility and Power of Cleaning a Landscape

This paper investigates why the culling of corvids in Northern Cyprus continues despite it being recognised by those that do it as ineffective. Participant observation, semi-structured interviews and archival research were conducted with a range of people involved in the management and practice of culling. The analysis shows that the introduction of the ruined landscape narrative to Cyprus during the era of British colonialism established a division between civilized and uncivilized, clean, and dirty behaviours amongst nonhuman animals. This relationship has been carried through into contemporary wildlife management by organisations involved in hunting who seek to maintain a clean hunting landscape through culling. However, it is argued here that this culling is futile and there is a disconnect between the effectiveness of the management of the landscape and what hunters are witnessing during hunting. Nonetheless, it continues because the cleaning of corvids as administratively recorded waste demonstrates the organisations’ and their administrative medium’s power and control over the landscape

Six new variants of the Terminalia cloud forest in the Dhofar Mountains of Oman

Background and Aims: The Terminalia cloud forest is endemic to a 200-km stretch of coastal mountains in southern Arabia. This research aims to describe patterns of variation in the species composition of the Terminalia forest in Dhofar, Oman and examine causal environmental factors. Study area: The Jabal Qamar mountain range, Dhofar, Oman. Methods: Hierarchical cluster analysis and indicator species analysis were used to identify and describe variants of the Terminalia forest. Topoclimatic factors, vegetation characteristics and disturbance factors were compared between the variants using ordination and ANOVA or Kruskal-Wallis tests. Results: Six new variants of the Terminalia forest are described. These are the Dodonaea viscosa subsp. angustifolia shrubland variant, Cadia purpurea-Olea europaea forest variant, Euclea racemosa-Jasminum grandiflorum shrubland variant, Gymnosporia dhofarensis-Ficus sycomorus woodland variant, Jatropha dhofarica-Zygocarpum dhofarense sparse woodland variant and the Premna resinosa-Hybanthus durus forest variant. A seventh variant was identified, which was previously described by Kürschner et al. (2004); the broad-leaved Blepharispermum hirtum shrubland. The species composition and environmental conditions indicate that two variants are the result of anthropogenic disturbance, whilst the other variants are well separated along fog density and topographic position gradients. Conclusions: Distinct variants of the Terminalia forest in Jabal Qamar result from spatial variability in environmental conditions associated with the complex topography, monsoon fog distributions, and anthropogenic disturbance. The results of this study could assist practitioners to rapidly identify and prioritise these variants for conservation

The Science-Practice Interface of Connectivity in England

Context: A disconnect has been identified at the interface between landscape science and practice. More commonly, it is assumed that better or more targeted science would lead to better practice. Others argue that such a view is partial, and propose an understanding that foregrounds how social and political factors shape the sciencepractice interface. Objectives: In this study we explore how (the combination of) different conceptualisations, novel governance architectures, and political-economic conditions shape the science practice interface between landscape ecology and practice, using connectivity conservation and enhancement initiatives in England as a case study. Methods: We conducted interviews (n=36) with practitioners involved in connectivity-related projects (predominantly Nature Improvement Areas and Green Infrastructure initiatives). We transcribed and analysed the interviews using standard methods of qualitative analysis. We also conducted a desk study of green infrastructure strategies (n=58 documents). Results: Enhancing or maintaining connectivity is perceived positively by conservation and planning practitioners in England. Quantitative assessments are rare on the ground. Conceptual ambiguity, lack of resources (time, personnel, software and hardware), novel governance architectures, and changing economic and political conditions are implicated. Conclusions: We find that the co-articulation of conceptual ambiguity and resource issues with novel forms of governance in changing economies is diminishing opportunities and creating challenges for (ecological) connectivity conservation. This is particularly true in relation to large scale operationalisation that requires multi-scale and multi-partner coordination

Contemporary Pastoralism in the Dhofar Mountains of Oman

In the Dhofar Mountains of Oman stakeholders are concerned about the social and ecological sustainability of pastoralism. In this study we used interviews with pastoralists to examine the prevailing drivers of pastoralism and how they are changing. We find that people are committed to pastoralism for sociocultural reasons, but also that this commitment is under pressure because of husbandry costs and changing values. We find that capital investment in feedstuff enables pastoralists to overcome the density-dependent regulation of livestock populations. However, high production costs deter investment in marketing and commercialization, and there is little offtake of local livestock. Our study reveals how pastoral values, passed down within households, motivate pastoralism in the face of high husbandry costs, modernization and social change

Perceptions of Climate Adaptation and Mitigation: An Approach from Societies in Southern Ecuadorian Andes

Climate research has steadily identified that public responses to the impacts associated with climate change are locally adjusted. These responses are mostly shaped by the prevailing socio-cultural knowledge systems underpinned by resilience thinking in the face of change and adversity. Despite the increasing scientific and policy attention to peoples’ perceptions of climatic changes and adaptive responses, there is still a lag in the more detailed probing and exploration of the local level demographic profiles related to the perceptions of and attitudes and responses to mitigation and adaptation strategies. This is of particular importance as the research, planning, and action concerning climate change mitigation and adaptation needs to be informed by and implemented within specific place contexts. Based largely on semi-structured interviews and complementary face-to-face questionnaires, this study focuses on southern Ecuador to identify people’s stances on climate change mitigation and adaptation and to investigate further the perceptions of farmers on adaptation. The results indicate a tendency among urban residents towards a pro-mitigation stance. Those with a pro-adaptation stance are mainly the residents of rural areas and farmers. Farmers appeared to be highly adaptive to climatic changes and are led by a self-assessed ability to adapt. Their adaptive responses vary according to the geographical place of residence, type of farmer, and age. The findings offer local level empirical evidence for designing effective adaptation strategies

The rise and fall of biodiversity offsetting in the Lodge Hill large-scale housing development, South East England

In this paper, we aim to shed light on the geographies that led both to the selection of Lodge Hill for the construction of a large-scale housing development and to the subsequent attempt to use biodiversity offsetting to compensate for its environmental impacts. We draw on extensive fieldwork from 2012 to 2016, and diverge from previous studies on offsetting by focusing less on issues related to metrics and governance and shifting our analytic attention to the economic and urban geographies surrounding the Lodge Hill case. We argue that this approach can offer not only an empirically grounded account of why offsetting is being selected to address the impacts of specific urban development projects, but also an in-depth understanding of the factors that determine offsetting’s actual implementation on the ground. Viewing the Lodge Hill case through the frame of urbanization allows us to better grasp the how, why and when particular alliances of actors contest and/or support the implementation of biodiversity offsetting. Our analytical lens also helps exposing the fragility of neoliberal natures and the roles inter-capitalist competition and species biology and ecology can play on the success or failure of neoliberal policies

Conserving predators across agricultural landscapes in Colombia: habitat use and space partitioning by jaguars, pumas, ocelots, and jaguarundis

Habitat loss and degradation continue to increase across the tropics. Consequently there is an urgent need to understand their effects, as well as species’ habitat requirements and distribution within human-modified landscapes, in order to reconcile agricultural expansion with the conservation of endangered and keystone species, like the felids. We combined camera trapping and remote sensing-generated data into occupancy modelling to study the habitat use and space partitioning by four sympatric felids across an agricultural landscape in Colombia. The area includes cattle ranching and oil palm cultivation, an emerging land use in the Neotropics. Strong determinants of species occupancy were wetlands for jaguars (positive effect); water proximity (positive effect) for pumas; and pasture (negative effect) for ocelots and jaguarundis. Felid species except ocelots were never recorded in oil palm areas. Our results suggest that to align development with the conservation of top predators it is key to maintain areas of forest and wetland across agricultural landscapes and targeting agricultural and oil palm expansion to already-modified areas like pastures, which showed limited conservation value in the region. Lastly, as there was no spatial segregation between the studied felid species, conservation strategies to simultaneously benefit this guild seem possible even in modified landscape

Climate Change and Emotions: Analysis of People’s Emotional States in Southern Ecuador

Climate change involves multiple emotional expressions associated with specific labels, notably:‘concern’ ‘guilt’, or ‘scepticism’ However, there are other types of emotions that have been less analysed, such as ‘powerlessness’, ‘anger’ and ‘confusion’ that are of equal importance for predicting behavioural changes towards this climatic issue. Likewise, few studies in this research field rely on qualitative data to understand and identify the causative agents for the emotional arousal. This research explores a range of emotions, mixing those that have been widely studied and those that have been hardly analysed. It also looks at the demographic parameters associated with such emotions using a population sample from southern Ecuador. The study analyses quantitative and qualitative data gathered through structured-questionnaires whereby participants were given agency to select and define how they themselves sense emotionally climate change. The results indicate that two of the five participants' most selected emotions are shared with other nations (‘concern’, ‘guilt’), while the other three have been less reported and studied in the climate change field (‘powerlessness’, ‘anger’, and ‘confusion’). These emotions were found to be aroused by different reasons associated with specific demographic variables. The findings reveal the role of the cultural and local environment in the emotional arousal and its relevance for designing more effective climate communication campaigns