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Protected areas are highly heterogeneous in their effectiveness at buffering human pressure, which may hamper their ability to conserve species highly sensitive to human activities. Here, we use 60 million bird observations from eBird to estimate the sensitivity to human pressure of each bird species breeding in the Americas. Concerningly, we find that ecoregions hosting large proportions of high-sensitivity species, concentrated in tropical biomes, do not have more intact protected habitat. Moreover, 266 high-sensitivity species have little or no intact protected habitat within their distributions. Finally, we show that protected area intactness is decreasing faster where high-sensitivity species concentrate. Our results highlight a major mismatch between species conservation needs and the coverage of intact protected habitats, which likely hampers the long-term effectiveness of protected areas at retaining species. We highlight ecoregions where protection and management of intact habitats, complemented by restoration, is urgently needed., NA

Biodiversity impacts caused by alien species can be severe, including those caused by alien birds. In order to protect native birds, we aimed to identify factors that influence their vulnerability to the impacts of alien birds. We first reviewed the literature to identify native bird species sustaining such impacts. We then assigned impact severity scores to each native bird species, depending on the severity of the impacts sustained, and performed two types of analyses. First, we used contingency table tests to examine the distribution of impacts across their severity, type and location, and across native bird orders. Second, we used mixed-effects models to test factors hypothesised to influence the vulnerability of native birds to the impacts of alien birds. Ground-nesting shorebirds and seabirds were more prone to impacts through predation, while cavity-nesting woodpeckers and parrots were more prone to impacts through competition. Native bird species were more vulnerable when they occupied islands, warm regions, regions with climatic conditions similar to those in the native range of the invading alien species, and when they were physically smaller than the invading alien species. To a lesser extent, they were also vulnerable when they shared habitat preferences with the invading alien species. By considering the number and type of native bird species affected by alien birds, we demonstrate predation impacts to be more widespread than previously indicated, but also that damaging predation impacts may be underreported. We identify vulnerable orders of native birds, which may require conservation interventions; characteristics of native birds that increase their vulnerability, which may be used to inform risk assessments; and regions where native birds are most vulnerable, which may direct management interventions. The impacts sustained by native birds may be going unnoticed in many regions of the world: there is a clear need to identify and manage them., Belmont Forum -BiodivERsA Joint Project InvasiBES; German Federal Ministry of Education and Research BMBF; Alexander von Humboldt Foundation; Freshwater Science International IGB Fellowship Program; Projekt DEAL

Invasive alien species are a major threat to biodiversity and human activities, providing a strong incentive to understand the processes by which alien invasion occurs. While it is important to understand the determinants of success at each of several invasion stages—transport, introduction, establishment, and spread—few studies have explored the first of these stages. Here, we quantify and analyze variation in the success of individual animals in surviving the transport stage, based on shipping records of European passerines destined for New Zealand. We mined the original documents of Acclimatisation Societies, established in New Zealand for the purpose of introducing supposedly beneficial alien species, in combination with recently digitized newspaper archives, to produce a unique dataset of 122 ships that carried passerines from Europe to New Zealand between 1850 and 1885. For 37 of these shipments, data on the survival of individual species were available. Using generalized linear mixed models, we explored how survival was related to characteristics of the shipments and the species. We show that species differed greatly in their survival, but none of the tested traits accounted for these differences. Yet, survival increased over time, which mirrors the switch from early haphazard shipments to larger organized shipments. Our results imply that it was the quality of care received by the birds that most affected success at this stage of the invasion process., While it is important to understand the determinants of success at each of several invasion stages—transport, introduction, establishment, and spread—few studies have explored the first of these stages. Here, we quantify and analyse variation in the success of individual animals in surviving the transport stage, based on shipping records of European passerines destined for New Zealand. Our results imply that it was the quality of care received by the birds that most affected success at this stage of the invasion process.

Wildlife are under continuous pressure to adapt to new environments as more land area is converted for human use and human populations continue to concentrate in suburban and exurban areas. This is especially the case for terrestrial mammals, which are forced to navigate these habitat matrices on foot. One way in which mammals may occupy urbanized landscapes is by altering their temporal activity behavior. Typically, studies have found that mammals increase their nocturnal activity within urbanized environments to avoid overlap with humans. However, to date, the majority of studies on this topic have focused on single species, and studying whether this trend holds across an entire community has important ecological implications. Specifically, understanding how differences in species temporal activity response alters predator-prey dynamics and sympatric interspecies competition can provide insight into urban wildlife community assembly and provide a mechanistic understanding of species co-occurrence within these systems. In this study, we used data from a community science camera trapping project in northern Utah to elucidate how human influence alters the temporal activity behavior of five medium- to largesized mammals and how differences in species response affect predator-prey, human, and sympatric competitor temporal niche overlap. We found community-wide changes in activity across study sites, with increases in late night and midday activity and decreases in crepuscular activity within the more-urbanized site. However, species-specific behavioral changes varied, and these changes resulted in reduced overlap, especially between coyotes (Canis latrans) and their potential prey species. These results provide information on how human influence may alter community assembly and species-species interactions within a wildland-urban interface., University of Utah of Graduate Research Fellowship

Climate change threatens to push species to higher elevations and eventual extinction. Birds, in particular, are shown to be shifting upslope in the Neotropics and Southeast Asia. Yet previous studies have lacked the temporal resolution to investigate distributional dynamics over time in relation to climatic fluctuations, especially in the understudied Afrotropics. Here, we used 15 years of point-count data from across an elevational gradient (1,767-2,940 m) in Rwanda, to assess elevational shift rates and dynamics in a community of Afrotropical birds. In general, species shifted their elevations upslope by 1.9 m/year, especially at their lower elevational limits which shifted by 4.4 m/year. Importantly, these shifts occurred despite the fact that local temperature and precipitation showed little trend over the study period. Moreover, the interannual distributions of few species were associated with temperature, suggesting that temperature played little direct role in determining elevational distributions of birds. Instead, upslope shifts may be more related to incremental shifts in habitat and resources which lag behind decades of increased temperature in the region. Precipitation appeared to have more of an effect than temperature in determining interannual elevational changes, allowing species to expand their ranges in years of higher rainfall. Our results highlight the need to understand the mechanisms driving upslope shifts as they occur throughout the tropics. It will be critical for montane regions of the tropics to preserve contiguous blocks of forest across elevational gradients to allow wildlife to shift unimpeded., University of Utah Graduate Research Fellowship; Wildlife Conservation Society Rwanda Program

The raccoon dog (Nyctereutes procyonoides) was recorded for the first time in Turkey on May 10, 2019, and June 5, 2019, in the same location after 4668 nights of camera trapping in the forests of the Sarikamis region and Allahuekber Mountains in eastern Turkey. It was recorded in a Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) forest at 2340 m above sea level with extensive snow cover. Given that the nearest known population is in the forests of Georgia approximately 105 km away, there may already be a viable population in Turkey. As an omnivorous species with a high adaptive ability and high reproductive potential, the raccoon dog has strong dispersal capability. It is considered an invasive species in Europe and there are some ongoing eradication activities in several countries. Therefore, we strongly advise that the raccoon dog in Turkey be evaluated as an invasive species and that the relevant authorities conduct extensive research and any necessary management, especially where the habitat and local climate are more favorable for the species' reproduction and range expansion., Fondation Segre; Faruk Yalçın Zoo; National Geographic Society; Sigrid Rausing Trust; STGM; TANAP; Whitley Fund