The importance of buffer zones in mediating edge effects in forest protected area islands surrounded by seas of agriculture

Tropical forests alone host at least two-thirds of Earth’s terrestrial biodiversity, provisioning goods and services for human well-being at local to global scales. However, the future of tropical forests has never been more uncertain. Typically isolated and surrounded by human-dominated landscapes, a host of issues face tropical forests, including negative effects from fragmentation, isolation, edges, and human-wildlife conflict. Protected areas are a key approach in tropical forest conservation, but land use around protected areas, even large areas, may disrupt ecosystem functioning along edges. These disruptions can lead to a cascade of alterations, potentially penetrating far into forest interior and ultimately reducing effective size. Recent research shows quality of surrounding matrix can significantly mediate extent and magnitude of edge disruptions. Thus matrix matters greatly to protected area effectiveness, inviting us to revisit buffer zones. Crucial parameters to consider include permeability, hospitability, effectiveness at mediating interactions, effective buffer widths, and permissible human activities in the buffer. These are critical questions today as the need to maintain resilience in the face of climate change and food security concerns increases. Interactions between temperate and tropical forest protected areas and the surrounding matrix cannot be overlooked, emphasizing the need to consider buffer zones. 牂慯汤ⱹ眠⁥慣‬‬‬‬‬‬

Scientists have uncovered a growing number of examples of thresholds or tipping points in marine ecosystems. Many of these, like the phase shift from coral dominated to algal dominated reefs, have had undesirable consequences for ecosystem services and resource management. We define a tipping point as a point or zone where a small change in an environmental driver results in a rapid, nonlinear change in ecosystem conditions. Such tipping points have been associated with both reversible phase shifts and alternate stable states that may be difficult or impossible to reverse. We use meta-analysis to characterize tipping points in marine ecosystems around the world and assess factors that contribute to variation in the strength and pervasiveness of this phenomenon across different systems, ranging from the intertidal to the open ocean. We highlight examples where this knowledge has been incorporated into management, with varying levels of success. We then introduce a new four year, collaborative, interdisciplinary project aimed at linking the science of ecosystem tipping points to management via analyses, tools and a general framework that can help managers make better decisions and avoid potential negative consequences of unintentionally crossing thresholds. The project is being developed in collaboration with managers, policymakers, and case study partners to maximize its utility. This project may have benefits for conservation and resource management as well as restoration.

The criticality of rivers and riparian forests in sustaining biodiversity receives scant attention even in the much studied Western Ghats of India. This landscape over the last five years has also emerged to be the hub of protests against conservation programmes. Seeking to address this shortfall which we assumed to be a result of the linear approach of conservation, a two year research programme on River Moyar was undertaken in the Nilgiris district. The study was grounded in the academic domain of socio-ecology; thereby according equal attention to social, economic, cultural, political and ecological inquires. The 90km river along with the adjoining 2km riparian forests, totally encompassing 180km2 was assessed using continuous linear transects of 4km & 2km simultaneously for vegetation type, floristic composition, occurrence and density of major faunal groups, human settlements, artifacts and management regimes. While the results of the study reiterated the critical role of River Moyar in rendering the habitat its unique diversity, and identified major stakeholders, identification of three conservation-nodes along the river course helped in the development of microplans for action. These microplans were matured through strategic engagement between major stakeholders through an innovate process by which results of the study were converted into schematic diagrams and flowcharts. The entire process has now been mainstreamed into the regional working plan of forest department.

Asian elephants (Elephas maximus), are threatened by extinction. One of the identified threats to the elephants is there interaction with Humans. Although the importance of human elephant conflict management is widely recognized, it is still relatively poorly understood and often ineffective in the Indian Subcontinent. Managing such a conflict management needs to take into consideration different factors that are location specific, such as perceptions and attitudes of people, socioeconomic factors and culture, behavior of elephants, etc. A survey of attacks of Elephants was carried out in the critical corridor (Bailparao-Kotabagh Corridor) in Terai West Forest Division, Ramnagar, Uttarakhand, India. We recorded crop-raiding, property damage, attack by elephants, and fear of attack, in the area. The methods adopted to document the problem were forest trails and village surveys. We found that crop damage is a problem for nearly all families in the village due to proximity of their agricultural fields to the park border and the village location within a traditional elephant migration route.The attitude of the villagers towards elephants was depressing. The depredation by the elephant has created antagonism among the owners, which has resulted in little cooperation towards elephant conservation programs. The survey provides a set of recommendations for the mitigation of the conflict.

Brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) are declining across their native range and are the focus of major conservation and management initiatives. Despite considerable attention, we lack basic information needed for population-level management because they have very plastic life histories. In 2010, we began using passive integrated transponder (PIT) tags to monitor >2500 tagged brook trout in the Savage River watershed of western Maryland. To date, biannual sampling has yielded over >2000 physical recapture events, offering valuable insights into the structure and function of brook trout populations. Unsurprisingly, individual growth rates varied greatly among fish, ranging from 0 to 144 mm?y-1. More importantly, we found substantial growth differences among years, with some fish in their second year being as long as four year old fish. Such extreme growth events have major implications for population management, particularly because of the strong relationship between fish length and fecundity. The results also highlight the importance of multi-year data when using science to inform management. We are using linear mixed effects models to identify the roles of climatic conditions, habitat, and competition in driving growth rates and its implications for population resilience.

East Africa's dryland areas are famous for their spectacular wildlife, but are also home to

many poor communities. In recent years, initiatives throughout the region have increasingly sought to combine conservation with economic development. Kenya's community conservancies are a prominent example: local pastoralist households lease their land for conservation and eco-tourism, foregoing rights to grazing in return for regular payments. Conservancies are promoted as an effective means to enhance local well-being while achieving conservation goals, but their longer-term consequences are poorly understood. Focussing on the Maasai Mara area as a case study, we used a combination of household modelling, economic games and discrete choice experiments to predict what effect the creation of conservancies will have on levels of illegal grazing. Our results compare the economic conditions where conservancies will reduce a household's reliance on livestock with those where, by contrast, households will use their conservancy payments to buy larger herds, leading to higher levels of illegal grazing.

Keelan, Kayla, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Madeline Hall, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Margaret Holland, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Kelly Wendland, University of Idaho; Mikaela Weisse, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Lisa Naughton-Treves, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Catherine Woodward, CEIBA Foundation - Ecuador; Manuel Morales,

ECOLEX Ecuador
Evaluating the social impacts and ecosystem service outcomes of Ecuador's SocioBosque program

We provide a preliminary assessment of the socioeconomic impacts of Socio Bosque Ecuador's national rewards for ecosystem services program. Modeled after similar payments for ecosystem services (PES) programs in Costa Rica and Mexico, Socio Bosque targets areas of high ecosystem service value and deforestation threat, but is unique in its legislated goal of alleviating poverty through program participation. In 2012, we conducted key informant interviews with members of governmental and non-governmental organizations involved in program implementation, and semi-structured interviews with participants in three geographically distinct regions of the country. We provide a preliminary assessment of the current status of program's impact on land use and socioeconomic trends. Our interview results suggest that the incentives directed towards communities are fulfilling unique development needs, which could point to more substantial poverty reduction than the experiences reported by our set of individual participants. Finally, we connect the field visits and key informant interviews with past land use change in each of the three regions, to discuss priorities for future targeting. To conclude, we outline key research questions that should be addressed to ensure the future vitality of PES programs within and outside of Ecuador.

Wildlife corridors are a widely used conservation strategy. Least-cost models identify corridors that are expected to offer the least resistance to animal movement. These models rely on landscape resistance values that reflect how much landscape features impede or promote movement of a focal species. We studied kinkajous (Potos flavus) in a Costa Rican landscape to derive and compare 3 sets of empirical resistance estimates, namely (1) resistance estimated from analyzing habitat use data from GPS radio-tags on 10 female kinkajous, (2) resistance estimated from movement paths (from the same data), and (3) resistance estimated from 38 dispersal events (locations of 38 parent-offspring pairs inferred from 10-locus microsatellite genotypes analyzed in PARENTE software). Because conservation corridors are intended to support dispersal movements, the latter estimates are the most appropriate for corridor design, but they can be more expensive to obtain. Resistance values derived from the 3 datasets were similar, suggesting that resistance estimates from habitat use and movement paths may be reliable proxies for resistance based on parent-offspring pairs. Based on this kinkajou dataset, designers of wildlife corridors can rely on resistance maps generated from data on habitat use.

Toe clipping is a common technique for genetic sampling of amphibians, and involves the cutting of a single toe or toe-tip from an animal. However, recent research indicates that toe clipping may change the behaviour and/or survival rates of frogs and salamanders. This has ethical and conservation implications, and demonstrates the need to find reliable alternatives. We tested four genetic sampling techniques for the endangered Growling Grass Frog (Litoria raniformis) around Melbourne, Australia. We took a toe clip, cut a section of toe web, and took both buccal and skin swabs from thirty frogs captured across this region. For each of the four sample types, we compared DNA quantity, amplification success of mitochondrial and nuclear markers, and rates of genotyping error for eight microsatellite loci. We found toe webbing and buccal swabs to be viable alternative genetic sampling techniques for L. raniformis. However, skin swabs provided very small quantities of DNA and were unreliable for genotyping. Using a decision framework for assessing ethical trade-offs in ecological field studies, we identified the sampling technique that is optimal for amplification and genotyping success, and for species welfare.

As ecosystems change across the globe, the preservation of biodiversity will best be achieved by the conservation of evolutionary processes. A significant gap exists between the capabilities of current technologies and the biodiversity assessment tools upon which conservation decisions are made. Our research bridges that gap, demonstrating that the newest sequencing technologies lead to biodiversity assessments that: 1) provide better characterization of genetic variation present in an ecosystem and 2) better inform policy-makers. Using massively parallel sequencing to estimate phylogenies and calculate Phylogenetic Diversity (PD) of organisms in an ecosystem represents an enhancement to biodiversity assessment for conservation planning. In this investigation, robust phylogenies of angiosperms were estimated at two prairie sites in Nebraska, and three PD metrics were calculated and compared with species richness. The questions addressed were: 1) How are PD and species richness correlated? 2) How does PD vary between angiosperm plant families? and 3) How does PD vary between ecosystems? Complete plastid genomes plus nrDNA genes were recovered for 30 species of Asteraceae and Fabaceae for phylogeny estimation. The primary conclusion is that species richness and phylogenetic diversity are not always correlated. These empirical results give scientists and conservation planners a better understanding of the genetic diversity present in an ecosystem, beyond simple species counts.

Fire is used as a management tool for biodiversity conservation worldwide. A common objective is to avoid population extinctions due to inappropriate fire regimes. However, in many ecosystems, it is unclear what mix of fire histories will achieve this goal. Here, we present a method for determining the optimal fire history of a given area for biological conservation, based on the geometric mean of species relative abundance. Our case study is based on extensive field surveys of birds, reptiles, and small mammals in fire-prone semi-arid Australia. First, we develop statistical models of species' responses to fire history. Second, we calculate the optimal allocation of successional states in a given area, based on the geometric mean of species relative abundance. Finally, we use stochastic dynamic programming to show how managers could achieve a fire management target based on strong empirical data. We show that pyrodiversity, per se, does not necessarily promote biodiversity. In our case study area, middle (11-35 years) and late (36-110 years) successional states were disproportionately important for species conservation. By clearly defining fire management objectives based on the habitat requirements of species in the community, this approach could be used globally to maximize biodiversity in fire-prone ecosystems.

The increasing demand for prescribed burning on public land will lead to more frequent use of fire in ecosystems where little is known about appropriate fire regimes, such as the box-ironbark forests in north-central Victoria. This collaborative study was set up by researchers and government land managers to investigate the impact of prescribed burning on this ecosystem. A series of experimental burns were conducted during 2011 in two different seasons (autumn, spring) and at different levels of burn cover. Bird community monitoring was undertaken to look at density and composition before and after burning. A focal species, the scarlet robin Petroica boodang, was selected and radio tracking used to investigate the direct impact of burning and changes in territory, habitat use and foraging behaviour following spring burns. Scarlet robins proved to be quite resilient to high coverage burning of their habitat, remaining in areas of >90% burn coverage and canopy scorch, but there was an increase in extent of habitat used post-burn and some small shifts of territories. New nests were built in the post-burn landscape and two-thirds of tagged birds were found using the same territory one year post-burn. While there was little change observed in the density and composition of the overall bird community, radio tracking provided some insight into the impacts of burning on individual birds and highlighted the importance of adjacent unburnt forest for use as refuge during the fire.

Animal movement studies can provide insights into causes of decline, habitat use, range size, and interactions between species. Using GSM-GPS telemetry in Masai Mara National Reserve, Kenya, I assessed the movement patterns of three species of vulture that are rapidly declining. Results demonstrate that the association between vultures and migratory ungulates may not be as strong as once thought and thus that vultures may depend on other sources of carrion including non-migratory wildlife and livestock. Mortality data suggests that poisoning is the primary threat and that all three species are susceptible due to their extremely large home ranges, which are considerably larger than the largest local protected area, the 25,000 km2 Mara-Serengeti ecosystem. Movement patterns also demonstrate that competition between species may drive subordinate species to spend more time outside protected areas, thus heightening their extinction risk. Further comparisons of habitat use pattern and decline rates suggest that movement patterns may be a better predictor of extinction risk than range size. Animal movement studies can provide critical information for conservation practitioners and with cheaper technologies such as GSM-GPS, such studies should continue to expand into new species and regions.

The maned wolf (Chrysocyon brachyurus) is unique among canids; this species is an induced ovulator (ovulation occurs only in the presence of a male), unlike most other canids that spontaneously ovulate. Because females housed next to males, but without direct contact, ovulate normally, it appears that chemical signals facilitate ovulation. It is hypothesized that these reproductive signaling chemicals exist in the males' urine. Using an integrative approach connecting chemical-ecology techniques with reproductive behavioral observations, this project's goal is to identify male signaling compounds responsible for estrus induction. Urine samples and behavioral data were collected from maned wolves housed at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute. Results showed that female maned wolves interact more with male urine collected during breeding season compared with samples collected outside breeding season. Using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, over 120 volatile compounds were identified including alkyl-pyrazines, thiols, thiophenes, ketones, and hemiterpenoids, including compounds that may be unique to males. The findings suggest that certain urinary volatile compounds may signal individual identity, sex, and reproduction among conspecifics. Results generated from this research will be applied to develop a non-invasive method of inducing estrus, easing captive breeding management while advancing assisted reproductive technologies in this threatened species.