Contaminant Mobilization Associated with Ecosystem Restoration Projects

Typically, ecosystem restoration involves restoration of wetlands and floodplains that have been diked off for agricultural development, or filled with dredge spoils. Ecosystem restoration results in new habitat and many benefits to aquatic species. However, inundation may also result in mobilization of certain types of contaminants that are relatively immobile in uplands, but can be very mobile, bioavailable and toxic in an aquatic system. Residues of copper, arsenic, pesticides and herbicides may be present in agricultural soils. In some cases, historic contaminants that have been bound to soils, are remobilized under inundated conditions. The potential for mobilization and effects on aquatic resources is dependent on many factors including: the fate and transport characteristics of the contaminants; how they partition in the environment; feeding behavior of aquatic species; metabolic pathways that can lead to accumulation or excretion; and foodchain dynamics. This presentation provides an overview of the risk for increased bioavailability in restored aquatic systems for some of the typical contaminants. Mercury and selenium will be highlighted, based on the author's recent evaluation of contaminant dynamics associated with the Bay Delta Conservation Plan in California. Potential mitigation measures that can be taken to minimize contaminant mobilization will also be presented, with an emphasis on mercury.

A 2008 population survey in the Endau Rompin Landscape (ERL) in the southern part of Peninsular Malaysia produced a population estimate of 135 (95% CI = [80, 225]) elephants in the 2500 km2 study area. The population is of clear national and regional significance, and with effective management elephant numbers could probably double. We used data from our survey and other, published, sources to conduct a population viability analysis (PVA) to assess relative extinction risk under several different management scenarios. Our results demonstrate that the population cannot sustain even very low levels of removal for translocation, a method previously used extensively in Peninsular Malaysia to manage human-elephant conflict (HEC). We describe, therefore, an alternative management approach, informed by this analysis, that focuses on (1) in situ management and non-translocation based methods for preventing or mitigating HEC except for populations that are clearly doomed (e.g. they are very small and isolated from other populations); (2) an increase in effective law enforcement to protect the elephants and their habitat; (3) efforts to maintain habitat connectivity between the ERL and other elephant habitat within the country's Central Forest Spine; and (4) an emphasis on continuing to monitor population size and trend with a new focus on adaptive management.

The global increase in large-scale solar electric generating projects has resulted in a growing number of programs involving the translocation of sensitive species, including the Mojave desert tortoise, Gopherus agassizii, which is a federally threatened species. Translocation has become a common management tool for desert tortoises, yet only recently have movement and space use patterns been investigated. Here we describe results from the first year of a ten-year post-translocation monitoring project involving approximately 400 individuals in the Ivanpah Valley of southern California. Goals of this project include determining the effectiveness of translocation as a conservation tool through a comprehensive monitoring program. Estimates of space use were derived from systematically collected radio tracking data and reflected differential patterns of habitat use among translocated, resident, and control groups. Similar to previous studies, we found differences in utilization distribution (UD) size among all groups, with translocated tortoises having larger UDs. We also found differential space use patterns in which translocated tortoises were found more often above ground than in burrows, when compared to both control and resident groups. Ongoing work includes model-based survival analysis that incorporates information on habitat features, as well as tortoise health status, to rigorously evaluate the influence of translocation on survival of this long-lived desert dweller.

Citizen science is an effective tool to collect loads of biodiversity data, but the impact of data in real conservation is highly dependent on validation and dissemination. This is not less evident when working with organism groups that are species rich, challenging to identify to species and generally neglected in conservation. The Danish Basidiomycote atlas, initiated in 2009, has the bold ambition to collect data on all mushrooms in Denmark (c. 2800 species), and to make this information available for nature managers that normally do not consider fungi in their work. Both data validation and dissemination is managed via interactive web platforms, but with different front ends for volunteer data providers and data users. The project has collected more than 200.000 validated species records, and resulted in the discovery of more than 150 species new to Denmark. Data are increasingly used in conservation planning. By combining user surveys with analyses of submitted data, I analysed how background of data providers influence the quality and novelty of submitted data. The results show that volunteers with a professional background are much more efficient in delivering novel data on red-listed species compared to non-specialist volunteers, which on the other hand are efficient in monitoring known populations of red-listed species. These results are important to consider in spatial conservation planning, by correcting data, not only for collecting intensity but also quality.

Conservation planning must take into account climate changes to achieve conservation goals in the future. At the same time, there is great uncertainty in the rate, magnitude, and sometimes the direction of change, as well as the response of ecological communities. Given uncertainty, methods need to be developed to do adaptation planning that do not rely on best guess estimates of how the climate will change or how species will respond. Here I report on an experiment done in collaboration with TBC3.org, which targets spatial and temporal elements of climate on the landscape to improve the resilience of the Conservation Lands Network in the San Francisco Bay Area. I share results from an experiment comparing how different protected area network configurations based on climate types, resolved at the 270 meter scale, or vegetation types, resolved at the 30 meter scale, compare in the representation of climate diversity now and in the future, with the assumption that greater climatic diversity is an asset for biodiversity. Results suggest that vegetation filters function similarly to climate filters in terms of representing climatic diversity on the landscape today and in alternative futures. However differences did emerge in some regions suggesting that targeting climatic elements introduces new information that may aid in adaptation.

Concern about global change has increased interest in the maintenance of forests for carbon storage and biodiversity but forests also provide important local ecosystem services. This interdisciplinary study used hunting surveys, botanical plots, interviews, and participant observation to examine the co-occurrence of carbon storage and biodiversity with local benefits of hunting success, plant use, and religious practices in the lowland rainforest of Papua New Guinea. Although some local uses may impact global services like carbon storage, many local benefits have minimal impact; therefore I classified local benefits based on their frequency and intensity of use. Local benefits, which require little to no extraction, such as medicine, tools, and religious practices, occurred more frequently in relatively undisturbed, primary forest that also have high carbon storage and biodiversity. However, local benefits extracted in high quantities did not consistently occur as predicted in disturbed secondary forests with lower carbon storage and biodiversity. Fuel sources were more frequent in secondary forests, but building material abundance was not different between primary and secondary forests, and food sources were more common in primary forests. This newly identified ecosystem service bundle of carbon storage, biodiversity, and minimal-extraction resources may find application in land management decisions integrating local and global interests.

Collapses of marine fish populations are a global concern. Some collapses are attributed to hyperstability, where catch per unit effort remains stable while the population declines. Hyperstability is difficult to detect until after a population is depleted, thus nearly all such studies on the hyperstability phenomenon are retrospective. Using whole-island acoustic arrays to track an endangered, aggregating reef fish on two Caribbean islands, we demonstrate for the first time behavioral mechanisms that might lead to hyperstability. We show that: (1) every reproductive-aged fish aggregates each year, (2) older, more fecund fish aggregate longer, (3) individuals will visit multiple aggregation sites during the spawning period, yet every fish always aggregates and spawns at a single location, and (4) overfishing extends the time spent aggregating, increasing vulnerability to harvest as the population declines. This latter finding is supported by historic accounts from other aggregation sites throughout the Caribbean. Taken together, our results demonstrate that aggregation sites are a surprisingly complete and persistent geographic bottleneck for aggregating species, and this bottleneck is a feature that intensifies with depletion. Our results highlight both the extreme vulnerability of local populations to harvest but the potential for even heavily harvested aggregations to recover.

Mexico's only endemic marine mammal, the vaquita (Phocoena sinus), is a porpoise widely cited as the most endangered cetacean in the world. With an estimated population of less than 200 individuals remaining in the Upper Gulf of California, entanglement in shrimp and fish gillnets threatens the vaquita with extinction within the decade; recent analyses suggest that mortality from this primary fishing method is responsible for an annual population decline of 9.7%. However, cessation of fishing is not considered a realistic option since it is the principal economic activity for the region. To date, the Federal Government of Mexico has invested an estimated $30 million USD in an attempt to maintain fishing livelihoods while protecting the vaquita, yet current management strategies have failed to halt the continual population decline. We conducted a quantitative tradeoff analysis that assessed total fishery value and projected impact on vaquita population over a 30 year period for a spectrum of different policy scenarios. Using spatially explicit fisheries and vaquita data, we modeled the theoretical effects of combining spatial closures, fishery closures, buyout programs, and varying levels of compliance. While a win-win scenario is unlikely, our findings provide a comparative evaluation of optimal policies to guide future management strategies that will achieve vaquita population growth at a minimal expense to fisheries.

Conservation of wildlife in developing nations is often dependent on international funding. In politically isolated nations such as Iran, economic sanctions imposed by other nations have severely reduced the work of conservation research and management by non-governmental organizations. This study measures the conservation implications of economic sanctions are by the progressively diminished foreign financing of Persian leopard conservation efforts over a span of five years, resulting in reduced resources for research, public education and management. As progressively greater restrictions are placed on international financial transactions, foreign funding for projects has diminished. Sanctions also stifle knowledge transfer between international non-governmental organizations, academic institutions and other organizations working in conservation. Persian leopard conservation funding by foreign institutions has declined by 90% since 2007. The subsequent economic crisis has quadrupled the rate of inflation within Iran, stifling domestic funding of conservation projects The deleterious effects of wildlife conservation as a result of political sanctions are quantifiable and must be examined in order to spark conversation about the need to shelter world wildlife heritage from political conflict.

Media coverage of environmental issues both reflects and influences public opinion and can have a profound effect on policymaking. Here I compare environmental coverage of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill and the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill. I conducted a review of relevant articles from The New York Times and The Washington Post from within the first month following each spill, excluding short pieces, news briefs, letters, and op-eds. I analyzed articles for source quantity and type, primary concern, emphasis on conflict versus solution, and presence of background or contextual information. My results indicate that the quantity and prominence of environmental coverage was greater for Deepwater Horizon than for the Exxon Valdez spill. In covering both disasters, journalists relied much more heavily on government and industry sources than on scientific sources, which may impact how environmental interests are relayed to the public. In both cases, journalists emphasized conflict versus solutions, which could influence public perception of environmental issues and reduce the impetus for participation in environmental decision-making. Media attention to technology was greater in the coverage of Deepwater Horizon, and the focus on environmental impacts was reduced, suggesting competition between the two for public attention. Media play a large role in setting the public environmental agenda, and coverage of environmental issues has serious implications for conservation.

Paleoecological analyses of macrofossil seeds, charcoal and pollen from two river banks in the Piedmont of Maryland and Pennsylvania were combined with geomorphic data and historical land use records to provide a 5000-yr and 3000-yr history of two valley wetlands. At both sites sedge meadows dominated by Carex stricta (tussock sedge), C. prasina, C. stipata and C. scoparia persisted virtually unchanged for 3-4 millennia until the 18th century, despite major storm events, regional beaver activity, fire, and anthropogenic disturbances. Wetland hydrology consisted of gently flowing water in rivulets and saturated organic soil maintained by springs from valley margins. In the Piedmont of Maryland and Pennsylvania the sedge meadow and associated hydrology is prime habitat for the endangered bog turtle (Glyptemys muhlenbergii). We suggest that these Holocene sedge meadows must have supported bog turtle populations for > 4,000 years. Burial of the sedge meadows happened rapidly in the mid to late 1700s when 1- 2 m of silt and clay sediment from land clearance (legacy sediment) accumulated in mill ponds behind downstream dams. Eventual breaching of the milldams created incised, high-banked channels and upland riparian vegetation not conducive to bog turtles. This study indicates that the current disjunct distribution of the bog turtle is a result of 18th century damming, and that habitat restoration might be accomplished by removing legacy sediment to expose the buried wetland.

Protected area management is, in part, an exercise in understanding and addressing visitor use of dependent natural resources. An accurate estimate of visitation allows managers to evaluate visitor use impacts and determine appropriate social and resource management objectives to insure their protection. Despite demonstrable benefits to be gained from accurate visitor use information, many managers rely on ad-hoc or convenience samples. Management entities with a wide diversity of social and biophysical conditions across their sites cannot use a single methodology to estimate visitation, but require a more flexible approach. Nonetheless, given the complexity of developing a sampling protocol unique to each site, a generalized framework for capturing these data and accurately estimating visitor use is essential in providing guidance and consistency at a site level. To that end, a generalized framework for developing site-specific sampling protocols to estimate annual visitation was created. This framework was then prototyped on Masonboro Island, a component of both the North Carolina Coastal Reserve and National Estuarine Research Reserve, in conjunction with reserve staff. Preliminary results from Masonboro Island indicate that the generalized framework has enormous potential benefits for resource managers in generating defensible, statistically-grounded estimates of visitation, particularly at sites with disbursed access to undeveloped resources.