When all life counts in conservation

© 2019 Society for Conservation Biology Conservation science involves the collection and analysis of data. These scientific practices emerge from values that shape who and what is counted. Currently, conservation data are filtered through a value system that considers native life the only appropriate subject of conservation concern. We examined how trends in species richness, distribution, and threats change when all wildlife count by adding so-called non-native and feral populations to the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List and local species richness assessments. We focused on vertebrate populations with founding members taken into and out of Australia by humans (i.e., migrants). We identified 87 immigrant and 47 emigrant vertebrate species. Formal conservation accounts underestimated global ranges by an average of 30% for immigrants and 7% for emigrants; immigrations surpassed extinctions in Australia by 52 species; migrants were disproportionately threatened (33% of immigrants and 29% of emigrants were threatened or decreasing in their native ranges); and incorporating migrant populations into risk assessments reduced global threat statuses for 15 of 18 species. Australian policies defined most immigrants as pests (76%), and conservation was the most commonly stated motivation for targeting these species in killing programs (37% of immigrants). Inclusive biodiversity data open space for dialogue on the ethical and empirical assumptions underlying conservation science

Biological Earth observation with animal sensors

Space-based tracking technology using low-cost miniature tags is now delivering data on fine-scale animal movement at near-global scale. Linked with remotely sensed environmental data, this offers a biological lens on habitat integrity and connectivity for conservation and human health; a global network of animal sentinels of environmen-tal change

Cautioning against overemphasis of normative constructs in conservation decision making

© 2019 Society for Conservation Biology Questions around how to conserve nature are increasingly leading to dissonance in conservation planning and action. While science can assist in unraveling the nature of conservation challenges, conservation responses rely heavily on normative positions and constructs to order actions, aid interpretations, and provide motivation. However, problems can arise when norms are mistaken for science or when they stymy scientific rigor. To highlight these potential pitfalls, we used the ethics-based tool of argument analysis to assess a controversial conservation intervention, the Pelorus Island Goat Control Program. The program proponents' argument for restorative justice was unsound because it relied on weak logical construction overly entrenched in normative assumptions. Overreliance on normative constructs, particularly the invocation of tragedy, creates a sense of urgency that can subvert scientific and ethical integrity, obscure values and assumptions, and increase the propensity for flawed logic. This example demonstrates how the same constructs that drive biodiversity conservation can also drive poor decision making, spur public backlash, and justify poor animal welfare outcomes. To provide clarity, a decision-making flowchart we devised demonstrates how values, norms, and ethics influence one another. We recommend practitioners follow 3 key points to improve decision making: be aware of values, as well as normative constructs and ethical theories that those values inform; be mindful of overreliance on either normative constructs or ethics when deciding action is justified; and be logically sound and transparent when building justifications. We also recommend 5 key attributes that practitioners should be attentive to when making conservation decisions: clarity, transparency, scientific integrity, adaptiveness, and compassion. Greater attention to the role of norms in decision making will improve conservation outcomes and garner greater public support for actions

Compassion and moral inclusion as cornerstones for conservation education and coexistence

Although coexistence permeates conservation policy and action, increased public awareness has not necessarily translated into action despite concerted conservation education effort. To galvanize and focus prosocial behavior, education that extends compassion to an expansive moral circle of living beings may encourage values of inclusion that are critical for actualizing coexistence. We used a pre-test post-test design to characterize the set of species that mattered to 52 Australian primary school students and to evaluate how a humane education intervention that encourages moral expansiveness and compassion can impact who matters and why. Following the program, the number of species that mattered to students increased and students expanded their moral circles of inclusion as represented by norms of intrinsic value. By successfully promoting greater compassion for non-human animals, interventions like coexistence education programs, and policies that replace negative norms with those that affirm the value of all living beings, the public may develop deeper connections with other living beings and ultimately feel inspired to coexist with and protect earth's biodiversity

Is the prickly pear a ‘Tzabar’? Diversity and conservation of Israel’s migrant species

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden 2018. Human-assisted biotic migration is a hallmark of the Anthropocene. Populations introduced outside their native ranges (‘migrant species’) have commonly been viewed as a threat to be addressed with lethal control programs. Israel has a long history of anthropogenic changes, and conservation has typically focused on ameliorating direct human impacts rather than eradicating migrant species. However, this may be changing with the growing influence of invasion biology worldwide. We conducted a review of the diversity, conservation status, and academic attitudes toward Israel’s migrant species (IMS). We identified 199 plants and animals from 85 families that have immigrated into Israel from across the globe, and 122 species from 64 families considered native to Israel that have emigrated to every bioregion and to two oceans, although few species have become cosmopolitan. The conservation status of most immigrant (84.9%) and emigrant (55.7%) species has not been assessed, and even the native ranges of eleven immigrants (5.5%) remains unknown. Of those assessed, 27% of immigrants are threatened or decreasing in their native ranges, and 62% of emigrants are globally decreasing or locally threatened and extinct. After accounting for local extinctions, immigration has increased Israel’s plant and vertebrate richness by 104 species. Israel’s immigrants are increasingly being viewed from an invasion biology perspective, with 76% of studies published in the past decade, reaching over a quarter of local conservation publications. Incorporating principles of compassionate conservation could help foster a more socially acceptable and morally grounded approach to the immigrant wildlife of the Middle East

Wildlife-friendly farming recouples grazing regimes to stimulate recovery in semi-arid rangelands.

While rangeland ecosystems are globally important for livestock production, they also support diverse wildlife assemblages and are crucial for biodiversity conservation. As rangelands around the world have become increasingly degraded and fragmented, rethinking farming practice in these landscapes is vital for achieving conservation goals, rangeland recovery, and food security. An example is reinstating livestock shepherding, which aims to recouple grazing regimes to vegetation conditioned to semi-arid climates and improve productivity by reducing overgrazing and rewiring past ecological functions. Tracking the large-scale ecosystem responses to shifts in land management in such sparsely vegetated environments have so far proven elusive. Therefore, our goal was to develop a remote tracking method capable of detecting vegetation changes and environmental responses on rangeland farms engaging in contrasting farming practices in South Africa: wildlife friendly farming (WFF) implementing livestock shepherding with wildlife protection, or rotational grazing livestock farming with wildlife removal. To do so, we ground-truthed Sentinel-2 satellite imagery using drone imagery and machine learning methods to trace historical vegetation change on four farms over a four-year period. First, we successfully classified land cover maps cover using drone footage and modelled vegetation cover using satellite vegetation indices, achieving 93.4% accuracy (к = 0.901) and an r-squared of 0.862 (RMSE = 0.058) respectively. We then used this model to compare the WFF farm to three neighbouring rotational grazing farms, finding that satellite-derived vegetation productivity was greater and responded more strongly to rainfall events on the WFF farm. Furthermore, vegetation cover and grass cover, patch size, and aggregation were greater on the WFF farm when classified using drone data. Overall, we found that remotely assessing regional environmental benefits from contrasting farming practices in rangeland ecosystems could aid further adoption of wildlife-friendly practices and help to assess the generality of this case study

Emotion as a source of moral understanding in conservation.

Recent debates around the meaning and implications of compassionate conservation suggest that some conservationists consider emotion a false and misleading basis for moral judgment and decision making. We trace these beliefs to a long-standing, gendered sociocultural convention and argue that the disparagement of emotion as a source of moral understanding is both empirically and morally problematic. According to the current scientific and philosophical understanding, reason and emotion are better understood as partners, rather than opposites. Nonetheless, the two have historically been seen as separate, with reason elevated in association with masculinity and emotion (especially nurturing emotion) dismissed or delegitimated in association with femininity. These associations can be situated in a broader, dualistic, and hierarchical logic used to maintain power for a dominant male (White, able-bodied, upper class, heterosexual) human class. We argue that emotion should be affirmed by conservationists for the novel and essential insights it contributes to conservation ethics. We consider the specific example of compassion and characterize it as an emotional experience of interdependence and shared vulnerability. This experience highlights conservationists' responsibilities to individual beings, enhancing established and widely accepted beliefs that conservationists have a duty to protect populations, species, and ecosystems (or biodiversity). We argue compassion, thus understood, should be embraced as a core virtue of conservation