Soapbox Science: spontaneous public engagement as a persuasive platform to promote women in science

Public engagement events tend to appeal to those already interested in science. Soapbox Science is an alternative approach to engagement that encourages spontaneous public participation. Co-organisers Seirian Sumner and Nathalie Pettorelli discuss the event taking place in London on the 5th July underlining the primary goals of increasing the visibility of women in science

The Differences Between Rewilding and Restoring an Ecologically Degraded Landscape

Rewilding is a developing concept in ecosystem stewardship that involves reorganizing and regenerating wildness in an ecologically degraded landscape, with present and future ecosystem function being of higher consideration than historical benchmark conditions. This approach differs from ecosystem restoration but the two concepts are often conflated because (a) they both rely on similar management actions (at least initially) and (b) it can be erroneously assumed that they both aim for similar states of wildness. Rewilding and restoring both influence biodiversity, and common management actions such as species reintroductions (e.g. beavers or wolves) can be integral to a rewilding project. However, in contrast with restoration, rewilding has lower fidelity to taxonomic precedent and promotes taxonomic substitutions for extinct native species that once underpinned the delivery of key ecological functions. We suggest the adaptive cycle as the appropriate conceptual framework in which to distinguish rewilding from ecosystem restoration. The focus of restoration ecology is to return an ecosystem to as close to its former state as is possible after a major disturbance, by directly reinstating it on the ‘foreloop’ of the adaptive cycle. In contrast, rewilding draws from the ‘backloop’ by promoting reorganization and redevelopment of the ecosystem under changing environmental conditions. If environmental conditions have changed so significantly that a regime shift is inevitable, then rewilding can facilitate the development of a novel ecosystem to sustain the provision of ecosystem services. Synthesis and applications. Rewilding and restoring both have their places in biodiversity conservation. In each case, their respective merits should be weighed in relation to stakeholder priorities, prevailing and predicted environmental conditions, the level of biological organization targeted for management, and existing and future management capacity. We provide simple schematic decision‐pathways to assist in exploring whether an ecologically degraded landscape might be a candidate for restoration, active rewilding, or passive rewilding

What shapes fire size and spread in African savannahs?

Fires play an important role in savannah ecosystems, shaping among other things vegetation structure and altering species composition. As direct and indirect anthropogenic pressures on these ecosystems increase, fire dynamics in savannahs are expected to change in the coming decades, with potential impacts on ecosystem functioning. Although the ecological impacts of fires are relatively well-known, the factors that shape fire dynamics in these ecosystems have received less research attention. Using Pendjari National Park (Benin) as a case study, we assessed the importance of different biotic and abiotic factors in shaping fire size and spread in the region. Our results show that fires spread faster (1) in the middle of the dry season compared to the early or late dry season, (2) in areas that are far away from natural and anthropogenic firebreaks, and (3) in areas that are covered with highly flammable vegetation. By contrast, most vegetation types had little influence on fire size, which seems to depend instead on rainfall. Our approach and results highlight new avenues for satellite data to improve our understanding of fire dynamics in large, remote savannah ecosystems and to improve our ability to predict how fires spread, a key variable for wildlife management in the face of rapidly changing environmental conditions

Testing Relationships between Energy and Vertebrate Abundance

Understanding what drives variation in the abundance of organisms is fundamental to evolutionary ecology and wildlife management. Yet despite its importance, there is still great uncertainty about the main factors influencing variation in vertebrate abundance across taxa. We believe valuable knowledge and increased predictive power could be gained by taking into account both the intrinsic factors of species and the extrinsic factors related to environmental surroundings in the commonly cited RQ model, which provides a simple conceptual framework valid at both the interspecific and the intraspecific scales. Approaches comparing studies undertaken at different spatial and taxonomic scales could be key to our ability to better predict abundance, and thanks to the increased availability of population size data, global geographic datasets, and improved comparative methods, there might be unprecedented opportunities to (1) gain a greater understanding of vertebrate abundance patterns and (2) test existing theories on free-ranging animals

Restore or rewild? Implementing complementary approaches to bend the curve on biodiversity loss

1. Restoration and rewilding are both relevant conservation approaches to addressing the current nature, health and climate crises. Here, we discuss the benefits of integrating restoration and rewilding in conservation projects. 2. We highlight how such integration could increase the amount of space available for nature recovery; boost knowledge exchange and raise nature recovery ambitions; enhance landscape heterogeneity and dynamics and improve large-scale connectivity. 3. In particular, the two approaches may be deployed to exploit synergisms. We argue that developing a portfolio of integrated approaches that capitalise on the strengths of both restoration and rewilding and target different scales and socio-ecological contexts is the best way to jointly address the biodiversity and climate crises. 4. We call for major policy platforms and international funding agencies to support the emergence of infrastructures and frameworks that facilitate the coordination and integration of the restoration and rewilding agendas. Such a step would benefit biodiversity and support broader efforts to integrate different conservation strategies into whole landscape approaches

Terrestrial or marine species distribution model: Why not both? A case study with seabirds.

Funder: Arcadia FundFunder: MAVA FoundationSpecies reliant on both the terrestrial and marine realms present a challenge for conventional species distribution models (SDMs). For such species, standard single-realm SDMs may omit key information that could result in decreased model accuracy and performance. Existing approaches to habitat suitability modeling typically do not effectively combine information from multiple realms; this methodological gap can ultimately hamper management efforts for groups such as seabirds, seals, and turtles. This study, for the first time, jointly incorporates both terrestrial information and marine information into a single species distribution model framework. We do this by sampling nearby marine conditions for a given terrestrial point and vice versa using parameters set by each species' mean maximum foraging distance and then use standard SDM methods to generate habitat suitability predictions; therefore, our method does not rely on post hoc combination of several different models. Using three seabird species with very different ecologies, we investigate whether this new multi-realm approach can improve our ability to identify suitable habitats for these species. Results show that incorporating terrestrial information into marine SDMs, or vice versa, generally improves model performance, sometimes drastically. However, there is considerable variability between species in the level of improvement as well as in the particular method that produces the most improvement. Our approach provides a repeatable and transparent method to combine information from multiple ecological realms in a single SDM framework. Important advantages over existing solutions include the opportunity to, firstly, easily combine terrestrial and marine information for species that forage large distances inland or out to sea and, secondly, consider interactions between terrestrial and marine variables.This work has been funded by Stichting Ave Fenix Europa. NP is funded by Research England; SOP and WJS were funded by Arcadia, The David and Claudia Harding Foundation and MAVA Foundatio

Aerial surveys vs hunting statistics to monitor deer density : the example of Anticosti Island (Québec, Canada)

Cervid densities have recently increased in many parts of North America and Europe. To design sustainable harvesting strategies, a good understanding of deer population dynamics and reliable estimates of population densities are required. This is especially true on Anticosti Island, Québec, Canada, where sport hunting is the main source of income, and where long-lasting impacts of white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus on the forest ecosystem have been reported due to high deer densities. We compared white-tailed deer densities estimated in 2001 on the basis of an extensive aerial survey of 512 plots, each 3.5 km long by 60 m wide, with indices based on hunting statistics in 24 hunting zones on the island. We found a positive correlation between the number of deer seen per hunter day and the density of deer estimated by the aerial survey, but this correlation was highly influenced by the four locations with the highest densities of deer. We detected no significant correlation between deer density estimated by the aerial survey within each hunting zone and the number of deer harvested per hunter day. Our results underline the need for comparative studies addressing the validity of density indices based on hunting statistics to monitor variations in cervid population numbers

Ultrasonic monitoring to assess the impacts of forest conversion on Solomon Island bats

Paleotropical islands are experiencing extensive land-use change, yet little is known about how such changes are impacting wildlife in these biodiversity hotspots. To address this knowledge gap, we characterized bat responses to forest conversion in a biodiverse, human-threatened coastal rainforest habitat on Makira, Solomon Islands. We analysed ~200hrs of acoustic recordings from echolocating bats in the four dominant types of land-use on Makira: intact forest, secondary forest, food gardens and cacao plantations. Bat calls were identified to the species level using a supervised classification model (where labelled data are used to train the system). We examined relative activity levels and morphological traits across habitats. Relative activity levels were highest in intermediately disturbed habitats and lowest in the most heavily disturbed habitat, although these differences were not significant. There were significant differences in the mean forearm length of bat assemblages across habitats, with the highest mean forearm length found in the most open habitat (Cacao). Overall, our study constitutes the first detailed exploration of anthropogenic effects on mammalian diversity in the Solomon Islands and includes the first acoustic and morphological information for many bat species in Melanesia. We use our experience to discuss the challenges of acoustic monitoring in such a remote and poorly studied region.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Early onset of vegetation growth vs. rapid green-up : impacts on juvenile mountain ungulates

Seasonal patterns of climate and vegetation growth are expected to be altered by global warming. In alpine environments, the reproduction of birds and mammals is tightly linked to seasonality; therefore such alterations may have strong repercussions on recruitment. We used the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), a satellite-based measurement that correlates strongly with aboveground net primary productivity, to explore how annual variations in the timing of vegetation onset and in the rate of change in primary production during green-up affected juvenile growth and survival of bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis), Alpine ibex (Capra ibex), and mountain goats (Oreamnos americanus) in four different populations in two continents. We indexed timing of onset of vegetation growth by the integrated NDVI (INDVI) in May. The rate of change in primary production during green-up (early May to early July) was estimated as (1) the maximal slope between any two successive bimonthly NDVI values during this period and (2) the slope in NDVI between early May and early July. The maximal slope in NDVI was negatively correlated with lamb growth and survival in both populations of bighorn sheep, growth of mountain goat kids, and survival of Alpine ibex kids, but not with survival of mountain goat kids. There was no effect of INDVI in May and of the slope in NDVI between early May and early July on juvenile growth and survival for any species. Although rapid changes in NDVI during the green-up period could translate into higher plant productivity, they may also lead to a shorter period of availability of high-quality forage over a large spatial scale, decreasing the opportunity for mountain ungulates to exploit high-quality forage. Our results suggest that attempts to forecast how warmer winters and springs will affect animal population dynamics and life histories in alpine environments should consider factors influencing the rate of changes in primary production during green-up and the timing of vegetation onset