Abstracts available here - Society for Conservation Biology

25th International Congress for Conservation Biology • Auckland, New Zealand • 5-9 December 2011
W. Macdonald, WildCRU, Oxford University;
Despite differences in focus, goals and strategies between animal welfare
and conservation biology, both are inextricably linked in many ways, and
greater consideration of animal welfare has considerable potential for
increasing conservation success. Nevertheless, animal welfare is not often
considered explicitly within conservation practice. Welfare considerations
are particularly relevant in reintroductions where human intervention
is extensive. We carried out a systematic review of the recent scientific,
and web-based, literature on animal reintroductions (mammals, birds,
amphibians and reptiles, but not fish). We quantified the occurrence of
potential animal welfare and ethical issues in reintroductions, and reviewed
monitoring that is currently carried out that might indicate animal welfare
status, and supportive actions that might improve welfare. We identified
seven aspects of reintroductions that currently appear to be underutilised,
that we believe are relevant to welfare concerns and warrant further
attention and we outline welfare and ethical considerations throughout
the reintroduction process. We propose that an Ethical Review Process
is implemented for reintroduction projects, similar to that required for
animal research in the UK, as a mechanism by which welfare and ethical
considerations could be better incorporated into reintroduction projects
and formally evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
2011-12-07 14:04 Methods for multi-species conservation planning in
the context of global change
Lawson, DM*, San Diego State University;
Multi-species conservation planning approaches are needed because
coexisting species respond differently to threats and management. I
present an approach using quantitative conservation objective functions to
synthesize risk of quasi-extinction (QER) from single-species, single-patch
stochastic population models. The objective function results for a set of
management scenarios are summed within a framework developed using
habitat suitability projections representing the extent and overlap of suitable
habitat under the present and two future climate scenarios. Management
scenarios are then ranked and the optimum selected for each climate
scenario. I tested alternate objective functions, QER thresholds and species
sets to evaluate the influence on the management rankings. I used results
from metapopulation models to evaluate dispersal effectiveness to inform
reserve design and the need for translocations. My case study involves
four species of southern California’s coastal chaparral, a highly fragmented
landscape. The species differ in response to the primary threats of altered
fire regime and, due to differing dispersal abilities, habitat fragmentation.
My results show the management rankings to be robust across QER
thresholds, conservation objective and climate scenario. However, some
QER thresholds failed to distinguish among management alternatives
reducing the influence of one species on the rankings. Thus thresholds
should be selected that distinguish among management. The species set
can strongly influence the rankings. Dispersal even for the species with the
best ability was not effective in the case study thus connectivity is a lower
priority that patch area and future artificial dispersal may be required.
2011-12-08 18:30 Long-distance dispersal by spores – How fat is the
tail?
LÖNNELL, NIKLAS*, Plant Ecology, Department of Botany,
Stockholm University,SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden; Hylander,
Kristoffer, Plant Ecology, Department of Botany, Stockholm
University,SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden; Jonsson, Bengt Gunnar,
Department of Natural Sciences, Engineering and Mathematics,
Mid Sweden University, SE-851 70 Sundsvall, Sweden; Sundberg,
Sebastian, Department of Plant Ecology, Evolutionary Biology Centre
(EBC), Uppsala University, Norbyvägen 18 D, SE-752 36 Uppsala,
Sweden ;
Dispersal is a key process important for understanding many conservation
issues like expansion of invasive species, survival of populations in
fragmented landscapes, and species responses to climate change. However
the dispersal ability of species with small diaspores is still poorly known.
To study the long-distance dispersal of small diaspores, we transplanted a
reproducing mother colony of the moss Discelium nudum (spore diameter
> 20 μm) into a non-habitat matrix in two open areas where the species did
not occur in the immediate vicinity and in a region where it is generally
rare. Approximately 2000 pots with suitable substrate (acidic clay) were
placed at distances up to 600 m and 1 km. From 40–50 m the maximum
colonization rate was stable with mean colonizations of between 1 % up to
600 m and 20 % up to 1 km, in the two areas. This study extends the studied
range by two orders of magnitude compared to most previous experiments.
A fat tail of the dispersal curve for many species with small diaspores is in
agreement with the inference from other studies on shorter distances and
from modelling. However, the surprisingly high colonization rate at the
longest distances in this study (600, and 1000 m) suggests a mixing of large
number of spores in the air before the colonization took place. This study
raises interesting questions about the role of a single dispersal source to
build up a high background deposition at landscape scale.
2011-12-08 14:08 The effect of forest habitat change on the breeding
success of an area-sensitive passerine- A multi-temporal approach
Le Tortorec, E*, University of Turku; Suorsa, P, University of Turku;
Helle, S, University of Turku; Käyhkö, N, University of Turku;
Hakkarainen, H, University of Turku;
Habitat fragmentation has been shown to have large, consistently negative
effects on a wide variety of species by, for example, increasing predation
rates and decreasing reproductive success. Although habitat fragmentation
has been extensively studied in a number of species the methodology used
has been somewhat one-sided since landscapes have generally been assumed
to be static in models. In this study we constructed a multi-year database of
habitat structure to study how intense forest harvesting affects the breeding
success of an area-sensitive species, the Eurasian treecreeper (Certhia
familiaris). We used an eight- year dataset (1999-2006) of morphological
and breeding data from treecreepers in Central Finland and combined it
with six classified Landsat images from the study period. For each year we
calculated the area of mature forests around each nest box at the breeding
territory (200m) and landscape (500m) scales. The classified images showed
that commercial forestry caused clear changes in the amount of habitat even
between single years. We also found that the amount of forest habitat at
the breeding territory scale was positively associated with the number of
fledglings produced. We suggest that incorporating landscape change into
species studies is necessary in order to realistically model dynamic specieshabitat
interactions. Our study shows that this can be accomplished through
a simple classification performed on freely available satellite images.
2011-12-08 15:00 Scale effects on indicators of biodiversity state
facing global changes: The relevance of the mean species trait approach
to evaluate the biodiversity fate.
Le Viol, Isabelle*, National Museum of Natural History, UMR7204
MNHN-CNRS-UPMC; Porcher, Emmanuelle, National Museum
of Natural History, UMR7204 MNHN-CNRS-UPMC; Julliard,
Romain, National Museum of Natural History, UMR7204
MNHN-CNRS-UPMC; Jiguet, Fredéric, National Museum of
Natural History, UMR7204 MNHN-CNRS-UPMC; Kerbiriou,
Christian, National Museum of Natural History, UMR7204
MNHN-CNRS-UPMC; Devictor, Vincent, ISEM, UMR 5554;
The ecological meaning and the relevance of biodiversity indicators for the
evaluation of biodiversity state are still debated and not clearly established.
Recent studies suggest that a new family of biodiversity indicators, reflecting
variations in explicit species-specific traits in species assemblages (Mean
Species Traits Abundance, MSTA), is relevant to survey biodiversity trends
facing global changes. Here, we highlight the strengths and weaknesses of
these indicators both from practical and ecological perspectives, focusing
on their relevance at different scales. Using the trend in the community
specialisation index as case-study, we show that this metric, which can be
easily adapted on several taxonomic groups (plant, invertebrate, vertebrate)
either with presence/absence or abundance data, is sensitive to several
human pressures at various spatial and temporal scales. Applied on trends
in Bird communities facing human pressures (fragmentation, urbanisation,
agriculture intensification), we highlight particularly their independence to
scale effects in comparison with more classical indices (richness, diversity).
Our results, which highlight the ongoing functional biotic homogenization
process from local to global spatial scale, show the relevance of such mean
species trait approach.
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