Use of agroecosystem matrix habitats by mammalian carnivores (Carnivora): a global‐scale analysis

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Assessing the vulnerability trifecta: species,climate, and anthropogenic pressures on protected areas of the Central Indian Highlands

Efficient management of protected areas (PAs) is important to ensure conservation and long-term sustenance of threatened species. It is therefore essential to understand the vulnerability of PAs in a multi-pronged approach by considering the cumulative effects of species, climatic, and anthropogenic attributes. We assessed the overall vulnerability of PAs in the Central Indian Highlands (CIH), which is a landscape of high biodiversity value. Over 81% of PAs experienced medium to high vulnerability due to anthropogenic pressures, and 68.75% of PAs faced medium to high vulnerability due to climate change and conservation status of species within the PA. Our categorization of PAs revealed that 50% of PAs were vulnerable to all 3 attributes. Further, there was a strong correlation between species and anthropogenic vulnerability indices in the PAs of the CIH landscape. Our results may help local policy makers in prioritizing the optimal and cost-effective conservation management of existing PAs, which can be extended for cost-effectiveness and efficient resource allocation of PAs, through this multipronged approach, beyond the CIH landscape.     

Projected range contractions of montane biodiversity under global warming

Mountains, especially in the tropics, harbour a unique and large portion of the world''s biodiversity. Their geographical isolation, limited range size and unique environmental adaptations make montane species potentially the most threatened under impeding climate change. Here, we provide a global baseline assessment of geographical range contractions and extinction risk of high-elevation specialists in a future warmer world. We consider three dispersal scenarios for simulated species and for the world''s 1009 montane bird species. Under constrained vertical dispersal (VD), species with narrow vertical distributions are strongly impacted; at least a third of montane bird diversity is severely threatened. In a scenario of unconstrained VD, the location and structure of mountain systems emerge as a strong driver of extinction risk. Even unconstrained lateral movements offer little improvement to the fate of montane species in the Afrotropics, Australasia and Nearctic. Our results demonstrate the particular roles that the geography of species richness, the spatial structure of lateral and particularly vertical range extents and the specific geography of mountain systems have in determining the vulnerability of montane biodiversity to climate change. Our findings confirm the outstanding levels of biotic perturbation and extinction risk that mountain systems are likely to experience under global warming and highlight the need for additional knowledge on species'' vertical distributions, dispersal and adaptive capacities.     

Comprehensive Red List Assessment Reveals Exceptionally High Extinction Risk to Madagascar Palms

The establishment of baseline IUCN Red List assessments for plants is a crucial step in conservation planning. Nowhere is this more important than in biodiversity hotspots that are subject to significant anthropogenic pressures, such as Madagascar. Here, all Madagascar palm species are assessed using the IUCN Red List categories and criteria, version 3.1. Our results indicate that 83% of the 192 endemic species are threatened, nearly four times the proportion estimated for plants globally and exceeding estimates for all other comprehensively evaluated plant groups in Madagascar. Compared with a previous assessment in 1995, the number of Endangered and Critically Endangered species has substantially increased, due to the discovery of 28 new species since 1995, most of which are highly threatened. The conservation status of most species included in both the 1995 and the current assessments has not changed. Where change occurred, more species have moved to lower threat categories than to higher categories, because of improved knowledge of species and their distributions, rather than a decrease in extinction risk. However, some cases of genuine deterioration in conservation status were also identified. Palms in Madagascar are primarily threatened by habitat loss due to agriculture and biological resource use through direct exploitation or collateral damage. The recent extension of Madagascar’s protected area network is highly beneficial for palms, substantially increasing the number of threatened species populations included within reserves. Notably, three of the eight most important protected areas for palms are newly designated. However, 28 threatened and data deficient species are not protected by the expanded network, including some Critically Endangered species. Moreover, many species occurring in protected areas are still threatened, indicating that threatening processes persist even in reserves. Definitive implementation of the new protected areas combined with local community engagement are essential for the survival of Madagascar’s palms.     

Temporal and sociocultural effects of human colonisation on native biodiversity: filtering and rates of adaptation

Modern human societies have negatively impacted native species richness and their adaptive capacity on every continent, in clearly contrasting ways. We propose a general model to explain how the sequence, duration and type of colonising society alter native species richness patterns through changes in evolutionary pressures. These changes cause different ‘filtering effects' on native species, while simultaneously altering the capacity of surviving species to adapt to further anthropogenic pressures. This framework may better explain the observed native species extinction rates and extirpation legacies following human colonisation events, as well as better predict future patterns of human impact on biodiversity.     

Distinguished primatologist address—moving from advocacy to activism: Changing views of primate field research and conservation over the past 40 years

Field studies of wild nonhuman primates have grown exponentially over the past 40 years and our knowledge of primate behavior, ecology, and social, and mating systems has expanded greatly. However, we are facing a major extinction crisis with some 60% of all primate species listed as threatened and more than 75% of species with declining populations. The primary factor driving primate population decline is human population increase, which over the past 50 years has resulted in the unsustainable conversion and degradation of natural landscapes for industrial agriculture, the production of nonagricultural commodities for international trade, pastureland for cattle, dam construction, fossil fuel exploration, mining, and the construction of road networks and infrastructure to support large urban centers. Recent ecological modeling predicts that by the end of the century, the four primate‐richest countries in the world will lose 32–78% of their existing primate habitat to agricultural expansion, and nine of the top 15 primate‐richest countries are expected to have 80–100% of their primate species extinct or threatened with extinction. If we are going to save the world's primates, the time to act is now! Not only should all primate field research include a strong conservation component, but in addition we must actively join with our professional societies, zoos and research facilities, universities, conservation organizations, concerned business leaders, global citizens, like‐minded political leaders, and grassroots organizations to inform, demand and direct governments, multinational corporations, and international organizations to engage in transformational change to protect biodiversity and seek environmental justice against those entities that actively destroy our planet. As the chief academic discipline dedicated to the study of primates, we must organize and collectively move from being advocates for primate conservation to becoming activists for primate conservation. This is a call to action.     

Conus: First Comprehensive Conservation Red List Assessment of a Marine Gastropod Mollusc Genus

Marine molluscs represent an estimated 23% of all extant marine taxa, but research into their conservation status has so far failed to reflect this importance, with minimal inclusion on the authoritative Red List of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). We assessed the status of all 632 valid species of the tropical marine gastropod mollusc, Conus (cone snails), using Red List standards and procedures to lay the groundwork for future decadal monitoring, one of the first fully comprehensive global assessments of a marine taxon. Three-quarters (75.6%) of species were not currently considered at risk of extinction owing to their wide distribution and perceived abundance. However, 6.5% were considered threatened with extinction with a further 4.1% near threatened. Data deficiency prevented 13.8% of species from being categorised although they also possess characteristics that signal concern. Where hotspots of endemism occur, most notably in the Eastern Atlantic, 42.9% of the 98 species from that biogeographical region were classified as threatened or near threatened with extinction. All 14 species included in the highest categories of Critically Endangered and Endangered are endemic to either Cape Verde or Senegal, with each of the three Critically Endangered species restricted to single islands in Cape Verde. Threats to all these species are driven by habitat loss and anthropogenic disturbance, in particular from urban pollution, tourism and coastal development. Our findings show that levels of extinction risk to which cone snails are exposed are of a similar magnitude to those seen in many fully assessed terrestrial taxa. The widely held view that marine species are less at risk is not upheld.     

Gone with the forest: Assessing global woodpecker conservation from land use patterns

Aim

As a result of their ecological traits, woodpeckers (Picidae, Aves) are highly sensitive to forest cover change. We explored the current land cover in areas of high species richness of woodpeckers to determinate regions where urgent conservation actions are needed. In addition, we identified woodpecker species that are sensitive to forest loss and that have high levels of human habitat modification and low levels of protection (through protected areas) in their distribution ranges.

Location

Global.

Methods

We joined available range maps for all extant 254 woodpecker species with information of their conservation status and tolerances to human habitat modifications and generated a richness map of woodpecker species worldwide. Then, we associated this information (the richness pattern and individual species’ maps) with land cover and protected areas (PAs) maps.

Result

We found that the foremost woodpecker species richness hotspot is in Southeast Asia and is highly modified. At the second species richness hotspot in the eastern Andes, we observed a front of deforestation at its southern extreme and a greater deforested area in its northern extreme but most of its area remains with forest coverage. At the species level, 17 species that are sensitive to forest modification experience extensive deforestation and have low extents of PAs in their ranges.

Main conclusions

The most diverse woodpecker hotspots are mostly occupied by human‐modified landscapes, and a large portion of the species there avoids anthropogenic environments. The level of representation of woodpecker species in PAs is low as a global general pattern, although slightly better in Asia. Our global analysis of threats to woodpecker from land use patterns reiterates the urgent conservation needs for Southeast Asian forests. Finally, based on our results, we recommend a re‐evaluation for inclusion in the Red List of five woodpecker species.

     

Spatial congruence in language and species richness but not threat in the world's top linguistic hotspot

Languages share key evolutionary properties with biological species, and global-level spatial congruence in richness and threat is documented between languages and several taxonomic groups. However, there is little understanding of the functional connection between diversification or extinction in languages and species, or the relationship between linguistic and species richness across different spatial scales. New Guinea is the world''s most linguistically rich region and contains extremely high biological diversity. We demonstrate significant positive relationships between language and mammal richness in New Guinea across multiple spatial scales, revealing a likely functional relationship over scales at which infra-island diversification may occur. However, correlations are driven by spatial congruence between low levels of language and species richness. Regional biocultural richness may have showed closer congruence before New Guinea''s linguistic landscape was altered by Holocene demographic events. In contrast to global studies, we demonstrate a significant negative correlation across New Guinea between areas with high levels of threatened languages and threatened mammals, indicating that landscape-scale threats differ between these groups. Spatial resource prioritization to conserve biodiversity may not benefit threatened languages, and conservation policy must adopt a multi-faceted approach to protect biocultural diversity as a whole.     

Global patterns of diversity among the specialist birds of riverine landscapes

1. Despite the growing view that biodiversity provides a unifying theme in river ecology, global perspectives on richness in riverine landscapes are limited. As a result, there is little theory or quantitative data on features that might have influenced global patterns in riverine richness, nor are there clear indications of which riverine landscapes are important to conservation at the global scale. As conspicuous elements of the vertebrate fauna of riverine landscapes, we mapped the global distributions of all of the world's specialist riverine birds and assessed their richness in relation to latitude, altitude, primary productivity and geomorphological complexity (surface configuration). 2. Specialist riverine birds, typical of high‐energy riverine landscapes and dependent wholly or partly on production from river ecosystems, occur in 16 families. They are represented by an estimated 60 species divided equally between the passerines and non‐passerines. Major radiation has occurred among different families on different continents, indicating that birds have evolved several times into the niches provided by riverine landscapes. 3. Continental richness varies from four species in Europe to 28 in Asia, with richness on the latter continent disproportionately larger than would be expected from a random distribution with respect to land area. Richness is greatest in mountainous regions at latitudes of 20–40°N in the riverine landscapes of the Himalayan mountains, where 13 species overlap in range. 4. Family, genus and species richness in specialist riverine birds all increase significantly with productivity and surface configuration (i.e. relief). However, family richness was the best single predictor of the numbers of species or genera. In keeping with the effect of surface configuration, river‐bird richness peaks globally at 1300–1400 m altitude, and most species occur typically on small, fast rivers where they feed predominantly on invertebrates. Increased lengths of such streams in areas of high relief and rainfall might have been responsible for species–area effects. 5. We propose the hypothesis that the diversity in channel forms and habitats in riverine landscapes, in addition to high temperature and primary productivity, have been prerequisites to the development of global patterns in the richness of specialist riverine organisms. We advocate tests of this hypothesis in other taxonomic groups. We draw attention, however, to the challenges of categorically defining riverine organisms in such tests because (i) rivers grade into many other habitat types across several different ecotones and (ii) `terrestrialisation' processes in riverine landscapes means that they offer habitat for organisms whose evolutionary origins are not exclusively riverine.     

Forest bees are replaced in agricultural and urban landscapes by native species with different phenologies and life‐history traits

Anthropogenic landscapes are associated with biodiversity loss and large shifts in species composition and traits. These changes predict the identities of winners and losers of future global change, and also reveal which environmental variables drive a taxon's response to land use change. We explored how the biodiversity of native bee species changes across forested, agricultural, and urban landscapes. We collected bee community data from 36 sites across a 75,000 km² region, and analyzed bee abundance, species richness, composition, and life‐history traits. Season‐long bee abundance and richness were not detectably different between natural and anthropogenic landscapes, but community phenologies differed strongly, with an early spring peak followed by decline in forests, and a more extended summer season in agricultural and urban habitats. Bee community composition differed significantly between all three land use types, as did phylogenetic composition. Anthropogenic land use had negative effects on the persistence of several life‐history strategies, including early spring flight season and brood parasitism, which may indicate adaptation to conditions in forest habitat. Overall, anthropogenic communities are not diminished subsets of contemporary natural communities. Rather, forest species do not persist in anthropogenic habitats, but are replaced by different native species and phylogenetic lineages preadapted to open habitats. Characterizing compositional and functional differences is crucial for understanding land use as a global change driver across large regional scales.     

A Global-Scale Evaluation of Primate Exposure and Vulnerability to Climate Change

Human-induced climate change poses many potential threats to nonhuman primate species, many of which are already threatened by human activities such as deforestation, hunting, and the exotic pet trade. Here, we assessed the exposure and potential vulnerability of all nonhuman primate species to projected future temperature and precipitation changes. We found that overall, nonhuman primates will experience 10 % more warming than the global mean, with some primate species experiencing >1.5 °C for every °C of global warming. Precipitation changes are likely to be quite varied across primate ranges (from >7.5 % increases per °C of global warming to >7.5 % decreases). We also identified individual endangered species with existing vulnerabilities (owing to their small range areas, specialized diet, or restricted habitat use) that are expected to experience the largest climate changes. Finally, we defined hotspots of primate vulnerability to climate changes as areas with many primate species, high concentrations of endangered species, and large expected climate changes. Although all primate species will experience substantial changes from current climatic conditions, our hotspot analysis suggests that species in Central America, the Amazon, and southeastern Brazil, as well as portions of East and Southeast Asia, may be the most vulnerable to the anticipated impacts of global warming. It is essential that impacts of human-induced climate change be a priority for research and conservation planning in primatology, particularly for species that are already threatened by other human pressures. The vulnerable species and regional hotspots that we identify here represent critical priorities for conservation efforts, as existing challenges are expected to become increasingly compounded by the impacts of global warming.     

The primate extinction crisis in China: immediate challenges and a way forward

China is facing an unprecedented set of challenges in balancing the effects of economic development and global climate change with environmental protection and maintaining biodiversity. Although positive steps have been undertaken to remedy this situation, currently 80% of China’s 25 extant primate species are threatened, 15–18 species have population sizes of less than 3000 individuals, and two species of gibbons and one species of langur have been extirpated over the past few decades. Today, virtually all species of primates in China inhabit fragmented landscapes and are distributed in small isolated subpopulations with limited opportunities to exchange individuals or genetic information. Here we present a historical framework examining how human-induced environmental changes, particularly since the second half of the 20th century, accelerated primate population decline in China. In addition, we modeled the expected spatial conflict between agricultural expansion and primate distributions over the next 25–75 years and assessed the current overlap between protected areas and primate distributions. Depending on the assumptions of the spatial conflict model, primate distributions are expected to decline by an additional 51–87% by the year 2100. Thus, unless large-scale conservation policies are implemented immediately the current trend of primate population decline, local extirpation, and species extinctions will accelerate. To mitigate against such extinction scenarios, we advocate the creation of a Chinese national agency and repository of environmental information focused on public awareness and education, the implementation of targeted programs of habitat restoration designed to return impacted forests to a more natural state especially within and at the boundaries of nature reserves, the establishment of additional protect areas, and the construction of a latticework of corridors connecting isolated primate subpopulations. This comprehensive approach offers the most effective way to protect China’s animal and plant biodiversity, including its endangered primate populations.     

Socio-economic and ecological impacts of global protected area expansion plans

Several global strategies for protected area (PA) expansion have been proposed to achieve the Convention on Biological Diversity''s Aichi target 11 as a means to stem biodiversity loss, as required by the Aichi target 12. However, habitat loss outside PAs will continue to affect habitats and species, and PAs may displace human activities into areas that might be even more important for species persistence. Here we measure the expected contribution of PA expansion strategies to Aichi target 12 by estimating the extent of suitable habitat available for all terrestrial mammals, with and without additional protection (the latter giving the counterfactual outcome), under different socio-economic scenarios and consequent land-use change to 2020. We found that expanding PAs to achieve representation targets for ecoregions under a Business-as-usual socio-economic scenario will result in a worse prognosis than doing nothing for more than 50% of the world''s terrestrial mammals. By contrast, targeting protection towards threatened species can increase the suitable habitat available to over 60% of terrestrial mammals. Even in the absence of additional protection, an alternative socio-economic scenario, adopting progressive changes in human consumption, leads to positive outcomes for mammals globally and to the largest improvements for wide-ranging species.     

Agroecosystems and Primate Conservation in The Tropics: A Review

Agroecosystems cover more than one quarter of the global land area (ca. 50 million km²) as highly simplified (e.g. pasturelands) or more complex systems (e.g. polycultures and agroforestry systems) with the capacity to support higher biodiversity. Increasingly more information has been published about primates in agroecosystems but a general synthesis of the diversity of agroecosystems that primates use or which primate taxa are able to persist in these anthropogenic components of the landscapes is still lacking. Because of the continued extensive transformation of primate habitat into human‐modified landscapes, it is important to explore the extent to which agroecosystems are used by primates. In this article, we reviewed published information on the use of agroecosystems by primates in habitat countries and also discuss the potential costs and benefits to human and nonhuman primates of primate use of agroecosystems. The review showed that 57 primate taxa from four regions: Mesoamerica, South America, Sub‐Saharan Africa (including Madagascar), and South East Asia, used 38 types of agroecosystems as temporary or permanent habitats. Fifty‐one percent of the taxa recorded in agroecosystems were classified as least concern in the IUCN Red List, but the rest were classified as endangered (20%), vulnerable (18%), near threatened (9%), or critically endangered (2%). The large proportion of threatened primates in agroecosystems suggests that agroecosystems may play an important role in landscape approaches to primate conservation. We conclude by discussing the value of agroecosystems for primate conservation at a broad scale and highlight priorities for future research. Am. J. Primatol. 74:696‐711, 2012. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

All is not loss: plant biodiversity in the anthropocene

Anthropogenic global changes in biodiversity are generally portrayed in terms of massive native species losses or invasions caused by recent human disturbance. Yet these biodiversity changes and others caused directly by human populations and their use of land tend to co-occur as long-term biodiversity change processes in the Anthropocene. Here we explore contemporary anthropogenic global patterns in vascular plant species richness at regional landscape scales by combining spatially explicit models and estimates for native species loss together with gains in exotics caused by species invasions and the introduction of agricultural domesticates and ornamental exotic plants. The patterns thus derived confirm that while native losses are likely significant across at least half of Earth's ice-free land, model predictions indicate that plant species richness has increased overall in most regional landscapes, mostly because species invasions tend to exceed native losses. While global observing systems and models that integrate anthropogenic species loss, introduction and invasion at regional landscape scales remain at an early stage of development, integrating predictions from existing models within a single assessment confirms their vast global extent and significance while revealing novel patterns and their potential drivers. Effective global stewardship of plant biodiversity in the Anthropocene will require integrated frameworks for observing, modeling and forecasting the different forms of anthropogenic biodiversity change processes at regional landscape scales, towards conserving biodiversity within the novel plant communities created and sustained by human systems.     

Species richness change across spatial scales

Humans have elevated global extinction rates and thus lowered global scale species richness. However, there is no a priori reason to expect that losses of global species richness should always, or even often, trickle down to losses of species richness at regional and local scales, even though this relationship is often assumed. Here, we show that scale can modulate our estimates of species richness change through time in the face of anthropogenic pressures, but not in a unidirectional way. Instead, the magnitude of species richness change through time can increase, decrease, reverse, or be unimodal across spatial scales. Using several case studies, we show different forms of scale‐dependent richness change through time in the face of anthropogenic pressures. For example, Central American corals show a homogenization pattern, where small scale richness is largely unchanged through time, while larger scale richness change is highly negative. Alternatively, birds in North America showed a differentiation effect, where species richness was again largely unchanged through time at small scales, but was more positive at larger scales. Finally, we collated data from a heterogeneous set of studies of different taxa measured through time from sites ranging from small plots to entire continents, and found highly variable patterns that nevertheless imply complex scale‐dependence in several taxa. In summary, understanding how biodiversity is changing in the Anthropocene requires an explicit recognition of the influence of spatial scale, and we conclude with some recommendations for how to better incorporate scale into our estimates of change.     

Noise Pollution Changes Avian Communities and Species Interactions

Humans have drastically changed much of the world's acoustic background with anthropogenic sounds that are markedly different in pitch and amplitude than sounds in most natural habitats [1], [2], [3] and [4]. This novel acoustic background may be detrimental for many species, particularly birds [1]. We evaluated conservation concerns that noise limits bird distributions and reduces nesting success via a natural experiment to isolate the effects of noise from confounding stimuli and to control for the effect of noise on observer detection biases [5]. We show that noise alone reduces nesting species richness and leads to different avian communities. Contrary to expectations, noise indirectly facilitates reproductive success of individuals nesting in noisy areas as a result of the disruption of predator-prey interactions. The higher reproductive success for birds within noisy habitats may be a previously unrecognized factor contributing to the success of urban-adapted species and the loss of birds less tolerant of noise. Additionally, our findings suggest that noise can have cascading consequences for communities through altered species interactions. Given that noise pollution is becoming ubiquitous throughout much of the world, knowledge of species-specific responses to noise and the cumulative effects of these novel acoustics may be crucial to understanding and managing human-altered landscapes.     

Functional richness of local hoverfly communities (Diptera, Syrphidae) in response to land use across temperate Europe

Environmental change is not likely to act on biodiversity in a random manner, but rather according to species traits that affect assembly processes, thus, having potentially serious consequences on ecological functions. We investigated the effects of anthropogenic land use on functional richness of local hoverfly communities of 24 agricultural landscapes across temperate Europe. A multivariate ordination separated seven functional groups based on resource use, niche characteristics and response type. Intensive land use reduced functional richness, but each functional group responded in a unique way. Species richness of generalist groups was nearly unaffected. Local habitat quality mainly affected specialist groups, while land use affected intermediate groups of rather common species. We infer that high species richness within functional groups alone is no guarantee for maintaining functional richness. Thus, it is not species richness per se that improves insurance of functional diversity against environmental pressures but the degree of dissimilarity within each functional group.     

Natural re-establishment of a population of a critically endangered primate in a secondary forest: the San Martin titi monkey (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Plecturocebus oenanthe</Emphasis>) at the Pucunucho Private Conservation Area,Peru

The San Martin titi monkey (Plecturocebus oenanthe) is endemic to a small area of northern Peru and is considered Critically Endangered on the IUCN due to massive habitat loss. Between 1994 and 2005 small scale reforestation efforts in the 23.5 ha area of Pucunucho have led to the recuperation of habitat from an area of pasture and crop lands. The first record of P. oenanthe re-establishment in the area is from 2010, although re-establishment probably began earlier. We carried out short population surveys using triangulation to monitor densities of P. oenanthe in Pucunucho in 2011, 2012 and 2016. We estimate the current population of P. oenanthe in this area at 27 individuals, giving population densities of 35 groups/km² and 124 individuals/km². The successful regeneration of habitat and natural re-population of the area by this Critically Endangered species provides evidence of successful reforestation based conservation activities for this and potentially other primate species. Although now protected as a Private Conservation Area, Pucunucho remains threatened.