Protection of endangered species has become controversial in the US. Biodiversity declines can be difficult to monitor, because animals can move broadly, and many avoid human observation. [Quaternary megafauna collapses in the Americas and Australia coincided with the appearance of humans; surviving species are small, fast, often nocturnal, and often restricted to regions of limited human pressure.] Attribution of declines to habitat degradation and/or climate change is difficult when there are multiple abuses with interacting effects. Conservation actions are controversial when stakeholders such as environmentalists, land owners, and industry perceive them to be “zero-sum” remedies–any benefit to one group must come at the expense of others.
In this vignette we consider evidence for bird declines and litigation surrounding the endangered species act (ESA), from the standpoint of stakeholders involved in litigation since the Obama administration.
Resources
Citizen science data
Files on Sakai
Resources/code/clarkFunctions2021.r
Resources/data/bbsExample.Rdata
In the media
Birds Are Vanishing From North America(New York Times)
Silent Skies: Billions of North American Birds Have Vanished(Scientific American)
Science resources
Decline of the North American avifauna(Science)
STATE OF THE WORLD’S BIRDS. (BIRDLIFE INTERNATIONAL)
The Audubon Climate Report A study of citizen science data, with species distributions models, to predict species at risk.
Connectivity of wood thrush breeding, wintering, and migration sites, Stanley et al on tracking wood thrush populations combined with BBS (Cons Biol).
Declines in insectivorous birds are associated with high neonicotinoid concentrations, Hallmann et al. find a relationship between bird declines and surface-water concentrations of insecticides.
Conservation Status of North American Birds in the Face of Future Climate Change Langham et al. report on the Audubon study.
Breeding bird survey, explanation and data, with supporting data
The IUCN Red List is a widely-referenced effort that divides species into categories of risk: Not Evaluated, Data Deficient, Least Concern, Near Threatened, Vulnerable, Endangered, Critically Endangered, Extinct in the Wild and Extinct.
Objectives
Introduce background issues on biodiversity threats from global change
Gain an exposure to concepts in modeling and computation, including data sources and quality, sources of uncertainty
For today
The discussion questions for today were:
The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species: what are the categories of risk, and how are they determined?
What is an IBA, and how is it determined?
At what time of year are the BBS surveys, the Christmas bird counts, and eBird done, and why is this important?
How are the counts done and why?
How are following practices contributing to bird vulnerability?
- agriculture
- logging
- other forms of habitat loss
- invasive species, including why they can be especially problematic on oceanic islands
How are following practices contributing to bird vulnerability?
- hunting/poaching
- fisheries bycatch
- climate change
Name three actions that can help relieve extinction risks.
What variables are used to predict future bird distributions? How well do you expect these models to capture the role of diet items (seeds, fruits, invertebrates) and natural enemies (other bird species, snakes, cats).
In Langham et al., the term climate sensitivity is a term is based on fractions of the current ranges that would be lost. Defend and/or criticize this interpretation.
How do habitat affinities defined by IUCN and Audubon differ?
Using the BBS data select a species for study, identify where it is increasing or decreasing. Based on your research, speculate on causes for increases or declines.
For next class
Building from question 11 for today, select four species each for mapping trends. Based on the research discussed today prepare A) a written summary for the individual species you selected, and B) a synthesis of all species selected by the class.
For A, your individual summaries will include:
The spatio-temporal trends (where is it increasing/decreasing?)
Possible explanations based on your research.
For B, you can enter your individual summaries in a google doc and begin thinking about the synthesis.