Spatial resilience in social-ecological systems

Spatial Resilience is a new and exciting area of interdisciplinary research. It focuses on the influence of spatial variation - including such things as spatial location, context, connectivity, and dispersal - on the resilience of complex systems, and on the roles that resilience and self-organization play in generating spatial variation. Professor Cumming provides a readable introduction and a first comprehensive synthesis covering the core concepts and applications of spatial resilience to the study of social-ecological systems. The book follows a trajectory from concepts through models, methods, and case study analysis before revisiting the central problems in the further conceptual development of the field. In the process, the author ranges from the movements of lions in northern Zimbabwe to the urban jungles of Europe, and from the collapse of past societies to the social impacts of modern conflict. The many case studies and examples discussed in the book show how the concept of spatial resilience can generate valuable insights into the spatial dynamics of social-ecological systems and contribute to solving some of the most pressing problems of our time. Although it has been written primarily for students, this book will provide fascinating reading for interdisciplinary scientists at all career stages as well as for the interested public. In this engagingly crafted book Graeme Cumming provides a novel, and I believe important, synthesis of spatial aspects of the resilience of coupled ecological and social systems

Current themes and recent advances in modelling species occurrences

Recent years have seen a huge expansion in the range of methods and approaches that are being used to predict species occurrences. This expansion has been accompanied by many improvements in statistical methods, including more accurate ways of comparing models, better null models, methods to cope with autocorrelation, and greater awareness of the importance of scale and prevalence. However, the field still suffers from problems with incorporating temporal variation, overfitted models and poor out-of-sample prediction, confusion between explanation and prediction, simplistic assumptions, and a focus on pattern over process. The greatest advances in recent years have come from integrative studies that have linked species occurrence models with other themes and topics in ecology, such as island biogeography, climate change, disease geography, and invasive species

Deforestation and economic growth trends on oceanic islands highlight the need for meso-scale analysis and improved mid-range theory in conservation

Forests both support biodiversity and provide a wide range of benefits to people at multiple scales. Global and national remote sensing analyses of drivers of forest change generally focus on broad-scale influences on area (composition), ignoring arrangement (configuration). To explore meso-scale relationships, we compared forest composition and configuration to six indicators of economic growth over 23 years (1992-2015) of satellite data for 23 island nations. Based on global analyses, we expected to find clear relationships between economic growth and forest cover. Eleven islands lost 1 to 50% of forest cover, eight gained 1 to 28%, and four remained steady. Surprisingly, we found no clear relationship between economic growth trends and forest-cover change trajectories. These results differ from those of global land-cover change analyses and suggest that conservation-oriented policy and management approaches developed at both national and local scales are ignoring key meso-scale processes

Broad-scale analysis of fish community data suggests critical need to support regional connectivity of coral reefs

Connectivity is vital for the biodiversity and functioning of marine ecosystems. It is known to be important for coral reefs, but the scales at which connectivity effects matter—and, correspondingly, the scales at which management responses are needed—are poorly understood in marine systems. We used 23 years of fish monitoring data collected from ~50 different coral reefs by the Australian Institute of Marine Science, together with a range of geographic data layers (including the Allen Coral Atlas) and additional network analysis, to explore the balance of local and regional influence on fish communities. Variance partitioning indicated that 42% of the variance in fish community composition could be explained by regional effects or their interaction with coarse-grained local influences (habitat). The variance explained by regional influences was divided evenly between measures that capture location on environmental gradients (e.g., proximity to coastal shelf, latitude) and cross-scale centrality measures of reef location within a broader reef network. A total of 11% of variance could be directly or indirectly attributed to management. Our results provide clear evidence that management and restoration of reefs across the globe must consider both local and regional influences on reef-associated organisms and highlight the potential benefits of improving connectivity in human-dominated coastal seascapes

Urbanization affects how people perceive and benefit from ecosystem service bundles in coastal communities of the Global South

Urbanization profoundly transforms ecosystems and the bundles of services they provide to people. The relationship between urbanization and how ecosystem services are produced together to form bundles has received increased research interest. However, there is limited understanding of how people’s perceptions of the benefits they receive from ecosystem service bundles change with urbanization, particularly in the Global South. Addressing this research gap is critical given perceptions influence how people relate to, use and manage their environment. We used a paired sampling design to contrast urban and rural dwellers’ perceptions of ecosystem service bundles associated with local ecosystems in the Solomon Islands, a rapidly urbanizing Small Island Developing State. Interviews from 200 households revealed that urbanization simplified the composition of perceived ecosystem service bundles. Contributions of provisioning and some cultural ecosystem services were reduced in bundles in urban areas, indicating a decrease in the diversity of experiences of nature and ecosystems providing those experiences. Examining changes in perceived ecosystem service bundles offers a valuable perspective on the implications of social-ecological change for ecosystem service demand and human wellbeing. Our approach presents a novel and simple way to identify and analyse bundles, providing insights into how and where people benefit from nature

Chapitre 4 - One Health : une perspective écologique et de conservation

Introduction Alors que notre planète est de plus en plus dominée par les activités humaines et leurs conséquences, nous nous retrouvons à vivre dans un monde où les zones naturelles sont de plus en plus réduites. D’un autre côté, les avancées technologiques nous conduisent vers une connectivité accrue et créent de nouveaux liens entre les personnes, les écosystèmes et les paysages à travers le globe (Helping, 2013). Les conséque..

Predators on private land: broad-scale socioeconomic interactions influence large predator management

The proliferation of private land conservation areas (PLCAs) is placing increasing pressure on conservation authorities to effectively regulate their ecological management. Many PLCAs depend on tourism for income, and charismatic large mammal species are considered important for attracting international visitors. Broad-scale socioeconomic factors therefore have the potential to drive fine-scale ecological management, creating a systemic scale mismatch that can reduce long-term sustainability in cases where economic and conservation objectives are not perfectly aligned. We assessed the socioeconomic drivers and outcomes of large predator management on 71 PLCAs in South Africa. Owners of PLCAs that are stocking free-roaming large predators identified revenue generation as influencing most or all of their management decisions, and rated profit generation as a more important objective than did the owners of PLCAs that did not stock large predators. Ecotourism revenue increased with increasing lion (Panthera leo) density, which created a potential economic incentive for stocking lion at high densities. Despite this potential mismatch between economic and ecological objectives, lion densities were sustainable relative to available prey. Regional-scale policy guidelines for free-roaming lion management were ecologically sound. By contrast, policy guidelines underestimated the area required to sustain cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus), which occurred at unsustainable densities relative to available prey. Evidence of predator overstocking included predator diet supplementation and frequent reintroduction of game. We conclude that effective facilitation of conservation on private land requires consideration of the strong and not necessarily beneficial multiscale socioeconomic factors that influence private land management

Comparing Ecosystem Service preferences between urban and rural dwellers

Urbanization can profoundly alter socioecological relationships, but its influence on how people perceive and value ecosystem services (ES) is poorly understood. We reviewed an emerging literature in which sociocultural valuation of ES is compared among urban and rural dwellers. This research suggests that, although regulating and cultural ES were highly valued by both rural and urban dwellers, urban dwellers tended to value provisioning ES less than rural dwellers did. Differences in ES valuation could result from different experiences, uses, and needs for ES of urban and rural dwellers. We also identified two key gaps in the literature that relate to understanding how diverse ES contribute differently to the well-being of rural and urban populations (and the relevance of these differences for environmental education and policy) and the changing roles of ES in developing countries and vulnerable ecosystems, such as small islands, that face pressing environmental, social, and economic challenges

Translocation experiment gives new insights into the navigation capacity of an African duck

Aim: Movement is integral to the distribution and abundance of wildlife. We undertook an experimental test of the navigation capacity of Egyptian Geese Alopochen aegyptiacus to better understand the movements of moult-migratory waterfowl and the implications of navigation capacity for their ecology. Location: Southern Africa. In June 2015, we translocated six post-flightless moult Egyptian Geese 1250 km south, from north-west South Africa (Barberspan) to the south-west coast (Strandfontein). We compared their movements to those of 29 previously tracked resident Egyptian Geese from the source and translocation sites, and three additional sites (Voelvlei; Jozini Dam; Lake Manyame, north-central Zimbabwe). Methods: We used solar-powered satellite GPS to track movement patterns and compared the movement paths of different birds using net-squared displacement analysis and multiple regression analysis of different measures of movement paths. Results: Over time periods up to 658 days, none of the translocated Egyptian Geese returned to Barberspan and only one appeared to fly towards it. Translocated birds showed some novel and risky behaviours. Longer, searching-type movements were evident with the onset of both the breeding and moulting seasons. Quantitative comparisons suggested that translocated birds retained elements of learned behaviours. Main conclusions: Navigation by Egyptian Geese appears to have a strong learned (internal) element, with long-distance movement triggered by internal states such as the need to moult. Translocated animals modified their movement patterns in ways that mostly allowed them to survive. Our results have interesting implications for understanding the dynamics of individual populations; a strong reliance on learned behaviours may explain the unresolved conundrum of why no African duck species has colonized Europe without human assistance. Our analysis demonstrates the complexity of influences on animal movement and highlights the importance of navigation capacity for conservation biogeography

A framework for testing assumptions about foraging scales, body mass, and niche separation using telemetry data

Ecological theory predicts that if animals with very similar dietary requirements inhabit the same landscape, then they should avoid niche overlap by either exploiting food resources at different times or foraging at different spatial scales. Similarly, it is often assumed that animals that fall in different body mass modes and share the same body plan will use landscapes at different spatial scales. We developed a new methodological framework for understanding the scaling of foraging (i.e. the range and distribution of scales at which animals use their landscapes) by applying a combination of three well-established methods to satellite telemetry data to quantify foraging patch size distributions: (1) first-passage time analysis; (2) a movement-based kernel density estimator; and (3) statistical comparison of resulting histograms and tests for multimodality. We demonstrate our approach using two sympatric, ecologically similar species of African ducks with quite different body masses: Egyptian Geese (actually a shelduck), and Red-billed Teal. Contrary to theoretical predictions, the two species, which are sympatric throughout the year, foraged at almost identical spatial scales. Our results show how ecologists can use GPS tracking data to explicitly quantify and compare the scales of foraging by different organisms within an animal community. Our analysis demonstrates both a novel approach to foraging data analysis and the need for caution when making assumptions about the relationships among niche separation, diet, and foraging scale