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Rewilding is a novel and radical conservation approach and while the concept is a broad one, without any set definition, broadly speaking it focuses on reducing human intervention and allowing natural processes to recover autonomously. This change to the location of agency in landscape, from human to other-than-human, coupled with the many ways that rewilding's lack of a distinct definition allows it to be interpreted, makes it contentious. Opponents see rewilding as a threat to established land use models and the social, cultural and economic systems associated with them. Proponents meanwhile see it as offering a positive and proactive future for environmental protection. As a burgeoning movement rewilding requires, and is generating, considerable research interest. This thesis provides a case study of rewilding in England, examining the boundaries that human and physical landscapes present to rewilding, and how those boundaries are negotiated. A preliminary round of twelve expert interviews was conducted to further understandings of rewilding and to inform the research project as a whole. Subsequently, two field sites, the Avalon Marshes and Wild Ennerdale, were used to conduct a pairwise comparison - stakeholder interviews, visitor questionnaires, and field notes and photographs were conducted at each site. Analysis of the collected data was informed by theories of boundary work, companion species and biopolitics. Particular attention was paid to the way that human and other-than-human boundaries are (re)negotiated with and through rewilding, and to the way that rewilding's boundaries are negotiated with respect to existing land use. Results demonstrated that ineffective communication was a significant factor in the negotiation of rewilding with its stakeholders. Rewilding was poorly understood and often poorly received, demonstrating failures to consult and engage with publics. Meanwhile, new biopolitical modes are being developed in relation to the other-than-human species involved in rewilding. These new modes of biopolitics can be problematic, especially when they result in changes to the status quo and/or when human and other-than-human interests conflict. This research advances the discourse relating to rewilding, particularly in England. I argue that a distinct form of rewilding is emerging, uniquely tailored to the English context - operating at smaller scale, permitting more human involvement, restricting the involvement of certain species, and, to a certain extent, limiting natural autonomy. This finding assists in furthering the debate about what role rewilding can play in cultural landscapes. More broadly this knowledge can also advance the way we negotiate conservation, land use, and human relationships with the environment and with other-than-human species.

Biodiversity has declined considerably across the globe and this is largely due to the destruction and degradation of habitats, which is predicted to continue in the future. Understanding the dynamics and mechanisms behind habitat loss and degradation can help predict future change and plan potential ameliorative actions, such as restoration. Long-term change studies have proved exceptionally valuable for understanding these drivers, though few studies examine more than two snapshots in time. As a result the current knowledge of these drivers of change, their trends and the resulting responses is deficient. This thesis examines the long-term drivers of habitat loss and quality in southern England over multiple time periods for a range of semi-natural habitats. The research questions are as follows; (i) What are the spatio-temporal patterns and drivers of habitat loss? (ii) Does habitat loss lead to extinction debts across a range of habitat types? (iii) What are the temporal patterns and drivers of vegetation change in calcareous grasslands? Chapters 2 and 3 address the first research question by exploring the dynamics of habitat change over time for a rural county in southern England. Historical surveys and contemporary spatial datasets were used to construct a habitat time-series dataset for over 3700 sites across the county between 1930 and 2015. This dataset was then used to model landscape maps for the whole county in 1950 and 1980 using the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST) Scenario Generator tool. These chapters revealed both the spatial and temporal patterns of loss, which were largely non-linear for the majority of semi- natural habitats between 1930 and 2015. The greatest losses occurred between 1930 and 1980, which coincided with the period of most rapid agricultural intensification in the UK. However, even after this period semi-natural habitats were still being lost, despite so few sites remaining. Statutory protection was important for retaining semi-natural habitats, which provides evidence for their effectiveness and the need for continued protection in the future. The fourth chapter utilises the datasets produced in the previous two chapters to test for plant community extinction debts (delayed species extinctions following habitat degradation) in three of the semi-natural habitats (calcareous grassland, heathland and broadleaved woodland), thus addressing the second research question. A key knowledge gap is addressed by comparing three different extinction debt methods. These three species-area relationship methods differ in their data requirements, with the first two using information on past and current habitat area alongside current species richness, whilst the last method also requires data on past species richness. The most data-intensive method identified extinction debts across all three habitats for specialist species, whilst the other methods did not. This suggests that extinction debts may be under-reported, which has important implications for employing conservation action. Chapters 5 and 6 address the third research question by focusing on long-term change and drivers of habitat quality using calcareous grassland as a case study. Both chapters used vegetation survey data from National Nature Reserves (NNR) spanning between the 1970s and 2010s. Chapter 5 used vegetation and soil data collected at Parsonage Down at three time points (1970, 1990 and 2016) and found declines in species richness, diversity and shifts in species composition across the survey period. Nitrogen deposition may have contributed towards community changes between 1970 and 1990, as indicated by the change in soil properties and the associated decline in species diversity. However, between 1990 and 2016 vegetation change is likely to be largely attributable to a reduction in grazing pressure, indicated by the increase in taller species and a decrease in grazing tolerance. Chapter 6 examined vegetation change alongside detailed grazing records across multiple time periods at Martin Down. Although a significant shift in the grazing regime was detected, whereby grazing previously occurred across all seasons to now predominantly occurring in autumn and winter, the vegetation communities remained largely consistent. This suggests that these vegetation communities are robust to changes in seasonal grazing providing that sufficient grazing pressure is provided within the year. The findings presented in this thesis demonstrate the importance of long-term data and the value of analysing multiple intermediate time periods to identify trends in drivers of change and their responses.

For over 40 years there has been conflict between hill-farmers and conservationists over the way that the Commons of Dartmoor have been farmed and the impacts that this has had on the moor's habitats, wildlife, peat and archaeology. This thesis looks at the attitudes of the various stakeholder groups involved via the use of semi-structured interviews. It uses Narrative Policy Analysis and the Narrative Policy Framework to construct and analyse a series of stakeholder narratives in an attempt to understand why the issues are so contested and the search for consensus has been so elusive. It shows how the dominant policy narrative has evolved over time and how this has been impacted by a series of competing counter narratives, in particular those focusing on grazing intensity and vegetation burning techniques. It details how restrictions to farming methods have impacted on traditional hill-farming practices and have led to a series of unintended consequences. As a result, further counter narratives have emerged, which either seek consensus between all the stakeholders or promote specific interests in an attempt to favour the wildlife, the archaeology, the hydrology or a re-wilded landscape. It shows that the issues on Dartmoor are complex and nuanced and it is suggested that historically some of the leading narratives have been too narrow in their focus and as a result may have missed other important causal factors such as atmospheric pollution and climate change. Hill-farming and as a result the traditional practices which have created the moorland landscapes for which Dartmoor is famous, are under considerable pressure as a result of changes to subsidy payments as a result of the UK's decision to leave the EU, the economic prospects for hill-farming generally and climate change. This narrative approach to the environmental and hill-farming conflicts on Dartmoor has identified areas which should be addressed so the moor's special character can be conserved and enhanced as a pastoral landscape, at least in part, into the future.

The freshwater pearl mussel, Margaritifera margaritifera, is considered vital to conserving the ecological integrity of freshwater systems, fulfilling the criteria of a keystone, flagship, indicator and umbrella species. Yet populations of this rare, long lived freshwater bivalve have witnessed substantial declines across the species' Holarctic range. River systems in the Scottish Highlands continue to support large reproductively viable populations; many of which inhabit regulated rivers, managed for hydroelectric energy production. However, there has been limited study concerning the response of M. margaritifera to alterations in habitat characteristics resulting from dam operation. Utilising a combination of field and laboratory experiments, this study aimed to address knowledge gaps regarding interactions between M. margaritifera and the hydrogeomorphological processes occurring within their habitat, providing urgently needed empirical evidence to drive future conservation strategies implemented by government (NatureScot, SEPA) and utilised by the hydroelectric industry (SSE). Initial lab-based work sought to derive methods to non-invasively quantify mussel stress. Here, variation in the expression of particular behavioural metrics was examined in accordance with measurements of oxygen consumption, across environmental stressors, and between two freshwater mussel species. Results from this study revealed an increase in the presence of behavioural traits associated with valve activity in response to stress exposure, in accordance with substantial deviations in metabolic functioning of corresponding individuals. This study corroborates previous work highlighting the potential of bivalve filter feeding organisms as indicator species for alterations in habitat conditions. Furthermore, results exhibit the applicability of these techniques to non-invasively quantify physiological stress in Unionid mussels, towards understanding thresholds in response to environmental stressors across individuals, populations and species. To understand the response of M. margaritifera to alterations in flow regime, resulting from drought conditions and dam operation, flume experiments examined the responses M.margaritifera from two different populations, to three different rates of drawdown, using two different spatial arrangements. Results demonstrated a propensity of M. margaritifera to detect alterations in flow depth, utilising vertical and horizontal movements to avoid prolonged aerial exposure. Data from this study foregrounded intraspecific variation between populations, indicating potential variation in behavioural phenotypic traits. Results from a field trial in a regulated system, using a subset of the corresponding M. margaritifera population, endorsed findings from the flume study. Evidence presented in this study advocates forcontrolled drawdowns in regulated rivers to assist in reducing mortalities associated with receding water levels, during periods of drought. Finally, this study developed and tested novel smart-sensors housed within mussel shells to provide an affordable, accurate and accessible tool to record near-bed flow dynamics in aquatic systems. The resulting instrumented shells were found to accurately detect, and potentially predict entrainment events in M. margaritifera. Entrainment risk was dependent on the flowrate, shell orientation and size; consequently, highlighting the importance of vertical movements in mitigating flow forcing, and the vulnerability of smaller mussels to high flow events. This tool could assist in identifying suitable habitat for M. margaritifera, guiding reintroduction and translocation efforts, and identifying at risk populations to surges in flow discharge. Recommendations are made towards future conservation management of M. margaritifera in Scotland, with a focus on adopting a context-driven approach at the population level. Work in this thesis has provided a foundation for the development of future monitoring techniques to improve understanding of M. margaritifera habitat requirements, in consideration of hydrogeomorphological processes.

The concept of indigenous and local knowledge (ILK) is not new in anthropology, but in recent years has gained increasing prominence within conservation. While anthropologists have extensively researched cross-cultural engagements, the same level of scrutiny has not been applied in conservation. This is potentially problematic as the global conservation community places increasing reliance on ILK and its holders. This interdisciplinary research explores how conservation might be better aligned with ILK through a case study of the Cyclops Mountains with resident indigenous groups. I use a mixture of qualitative, quantitative and participatory data collection and analysis methods spanning the natural and social sciences. I begin by positioning this research within the history of conservation, property rights and regimes, 'conservation' in small scale societies, and debates about ILK and its practical use in conservation. I then review and synthesise ILK related to conservation in South-East Asia and Melanesia finding that ILK research is distributed unevenly and based on diverse motivations. Further, when ILK research is motivated by conservation, three clear themes emerge: natural resource management institutions, wildlife and habitat monitoring, and sustainable use of individual resources. Subsequently, I draw together a discursive social, historical and political analysis of conservation and the transformation of ILK in the Cyclops Mountains finding that conservation policies based on ILK are inevitably intertwined with global and national issues. I then provide two case studies of ways in which conservation might pragmatically engage with ILK. I investigate the ethnozoology of the Cyclops Mountains by describing how locally salient species differ from species prioritised by conservation, how folk taxonomies are similar throughout the indigenous groups of the area, and how the heterogeneity of cultural domain expertise is influenced by local experience and indigenous language intactness. Finally, I explore how ILK can inform baseline monitoring of threatened species in the Cyclops Mountains. I close by discussing the practical difficulties of cross-cultural engagements between conservation biology and ILK, raising several concerns related to the scale and content of these engagements and the risks of placing a greater reliance on ILK for conservation and people.

Tropical forest covers just 12% of the planet's land surface, but disproportionately host the planet's biodiversity, including around two thirds of all terrestrial species. Amazonia retains the largest extent of remaining tropical forest globally, but just over 50% of all tropical forest loss since 2002 has been in the region. Deforestation and disturbance result in significant loss in forest biodiversity, but quantifying the exact nature of those changes can be complex. The Amazon represents a particularly challenging case in which to assess biodiversity change due to the spatiotemporal scales being assessed, because of the high proportion of rare species, and the challenging conditions for conducting biodiversity surveys in tropical forest. Ecoacoustics has been championed as a valuable tool to overcome the difficulties of monitoring in such conditions and at large spatio-temporal scales, but applied analytical methods often remain underdeveloped. In this this thesis I develop and use a range of ecoacoustic methods to help understand the impact of anthropogenic disturbance on Amazonian wildlife, using an extensive audio dataset collected from survey points spanning a degradation gradient in the Eastern Brazilian Amazon. In Chapter 2 I introduce a quick and simple method for the detection of rainfall, tested for efficacy globally and with an accompanying R package. In Chapter 3 I present a new approach to subsampling of acoustic data for manual assessment of avian biodiversity, finding that using a high number of short repeat samples can detect approximately 50% higher alpha diversity than more commonly used approaches. In Chapter 4 I assess the sensitivity and fidelity of two commonly used acoustic indices to biodiversity responses to forest disturbances, finding that measuring indices at narrower, ecologically appropriate time-frequency bins avoids problems with signal masking. In Chapter 5 I use a two-stage, random forest based method to build a multi-taxa classifier for the nocturnal avifaunal community in the study region, and use the classifier-derived data to reveal that the nocturnal bird community is largely robust to less intense forms of forest disturbance. Overall, in this thesis I demonstrate that ecoacoustics can be a highly effective method for inventorying and monitoring biodiversity in one of the most diverse and challenging regions on the planet.

Recording animal movements is essential for understanding the distribution of species over time, with far-reaching consequences for fitness, population dynamics and conservation. Oceanic seabirds are some of the most mobile and threatened species on Earth, mainly because of incidental mortality (bycatch) in fisheries. Tracking these birds has improved our knowledge of how the environment and individual traits shape specific foraging and migratory strategies; however, this research is biased towards adult life-stages, which are easier to track. In particular, juveniles remain understudied, even though they are likely to differ in their critical habitats and overlap with fisheries, and hence bycatch risk, with implications for population trajectories. In this thesis, I capitalize on recent advances in tracking technology and the wealth of data collected on threatened albatross and large petrel species breeding at Bird Island, South Georgia, to investigate variation in spatial ecology and fisheries bycatch risk across multiple life-stages and species. In Chapter 1, I introduce the main topics of this thesis. In Chapters 2-4, I investigate how wind and resource availability shape divergent movement patterns between juveniles and adult life-stages, and identify age-specific bycatch risk. As high juvenile mortality is likely to result in an ageing population, in Chapter 5 I examine senescence in foraging behaviour, and consider the ramifications for population recovery. In Chapter 6, I then assess the effectiveness of existing fisheries bycatch mitigation measures by investigating the diving capabilities of the most bycaught species in the Southern Ocean. Finally, I conclude with a general discussion summarizing my main findings and suggesting future work. Overall, my results provide new insight into the capacity and motivation for movement in wide-ranging animals; highlighting the diversity of extrinsic and intrinsic processes shaping movements over the lifespans of individuals, and with implications for focusing conservation efforts in time and space.

Static-gear fisheries using baited pots are an increasingly valuable component of the fishing industry in the Irish Sea. Target species include Common whelk (Buccinum undatum), Edible crab (Cancer pagurus), European lobster (Homarus gammarus), and Common prawn (Palaemon serratus). Together, the harvest of these four species from the Irish Sea area (ICES division VIIa) by British vessels totalled 7,938 t in 2019 and were valued at £14.67 million at the point of first sale. However, there is an absence of evidence-based management applied to the fisheries as a consequence of data-poor status in key areas including biological and ecological understanding of life-histories, fisheries-dependent information on catch and effort, and scientific assessment methodologies for stock assessments. This thesis aims to address specific knowledge-gaps important for the sustainable management of baited pot fisheries in the Irish Sea. Despite its relatively small size, the common prawn fishery is an economically important seasonal fishery in areas such as Cardigan Bay, Wales. The stock is prosecuted by a regulated open access fishery with no biologically referenced harvest control rules. In response to fluctuations in landings the fishing industry have adopted a size-selective harvesting regime of 10 mm carapace length (CL). This thesis presents a baseline of evidence for this fishery, and pays particular attention to the biological implications of size-selective harvesting and reproductive biology. Peak spawning occurred during the spring, whilst functional maturity of females was estimated at a CL of 9.9 mm. The species is sexually dimorphic, with females attaining a greater size than males. Size-selective harvesting results in a sex bias in landings as even large mature males often fail to recruit into the fishery. Whilst whelk fishing activity covers large geographical areas of the Irish Sea, whelk populations are known to be vulnerable to localised overexploitation, and despite the prominence of common whelk fisheries in the Irish Sea, they remain relatively unrestricted. This thesis evaluates fundamental biological parameters within an environmental context, focussing in particular on reproductive biology and growth. Analyses highlight that, at the time of sampling, the majority of populations were not adequately protected by technical measures with size-at-maturity estimates being greater than the applicable minimum conservation reference size. Using previously validated ageing techniques, size-at-age relationships are presented for Irish Sea populations. L∞ showed a significant negative linear relationship with sea temperature. Other parameters, including maximum growth rates and the age at which growth rate begins to decrease, showed clear trends with sea-bottom temperature but linear modelling failed to detect significant relationships. Despite the growing call to utilise fishery-dependent data in lieu of scientific stock assessments for data-poor fisheries, the resolution of these data are often insufficient for accurate catch and effort analysis. By trialling an Enhanced Electronic Reporting System (EERS) in the 'mixed' edible crab and European lobster fisheries in the Irish Sea, which integrates gear-in gear-out and mobile technologies, fisheries-dependent data has been shown to be a viable method of assessment. Using generalised additive models to investigate a dataset of environmental and fishing activity data, non-linear predictors of commercial landings-per-unit-effort (LPUE) data are estimated, which can be used to 'standardise' data. These analyses and techniques are later discussed in terms of integrating standardised LPUE data into management of the Isle of Man edible crab fishery specifically, and baited-pot fisheries more generally. Finally, population data are modelled to evaluate technical conservation measures in the European lobster fishery and common whelk fishery. Mark-recapture and size-structure data are combined to form an analysis and evaluation of the likely economic impacts to a change in minimum conservation reference size for European lobster in Isle of Man territorial waters. Size-selectivity of grading equipment trialled in the Isle of Man are assessed for common whelk fishery with reference to the earlier size-at-maturity estimates for the same population. Separately, the data presented in this thesis address a range of knowledge-gaps in baited pot fisheries in the Irish Sea by focussing on specific data deficiencies. Together, they offer valuable improvements and insights into evidence-based fisheries science, conservation, and management in the region, and are useful references for management of baited-pot fisheries globally.

Amphibians have been declining globally since at least the 1970s and are the most endangered class of vertebrates with over 40% of species threatened with extinction. The Natterjack toad (Epidalea calamita) is the rarest amphibian in Ireland, regionally Red-listed as Endangered. The species is subject to substantial Government conservation efforts, including regular monitoring and surveillance, a Pond Creation Scheme and an ongoing Head-start and Translocation Programme to facilitate new pond colonisation. This thesis aimed to update the Natterjack toad's conservation status in Ireland, establish temporal trends assessing threats and pressures, describe its genetic integrity and population structure and evaluate the efficacy of conservation measures. The new information generated spans habitat selection, spatial ecology, population biology, metapopulation dynamics, genetic diversity, biogeography and effects of climate change. Natterjack toad annual egg string counts suggested a -23% decline in the number of egg strings between 2004 and 2018 with local extirpation at one site. Assessment of perceived threats and pressures suggests that declines are likely driven by poor habitat quality. Conservation programmes failed to significantly arrest decreases in the number of egg strings offsetting further declines by only 4%. Nevertheless, the conservation value of artificially created ponds should not be underestimated as they had 43% higher aquatic macroinvertebrate species richness and 33% higher macroinvertebrate abundance than natural ponds. Mark-recapture using photo ID and genetic fingerprinting suggested that extrapolation of total population estimates from egg strings alone may underestimate the census size by up to 83% due to substantial sex ratio deviation from 1:1 with up to 7 males per female at breeding ponds. Genetic studies indicated high genetic diversity with no evidence of genetic bottlenecks or inbreeding depression despite considerable declines in the number of egg strings. The Natterjack toad population in Ireland displayed significant genetic spatial structuring, best explained by barriers to dispersal and gene flow inhibited by coniferous forestry plantations, bog, marsh, moor and heath, scrub, anthropogenic presence and rivers, and facilitated by sand dunes and coastal grasslands. Suitable bioclimatic-habitat niche space for the species is likely to expand northward and to higher elevations under projected global climate change with models predicting increase in the number of egg strings and earlier spawning by the end of the 21 century. However, limited dispersal capability and ongoing threats and pressures mean potential benefits of climatic change are unlikely to be realised. Continued population monitoring and surveillance is recommended while it is suggested that future research should include: estimation of sex ratio variation between metapopulations, use of acoustic monitoring to assess the male population at breeding sites, use of environmental or eDNA in assessing species presence including colonisation of new ponds and calibration of water DNA densities using population abundance derived from egg strings, a greater focus on disease and pathogens, and investigation of terrestrial habitat use and hibernacula availability. Species conservation strategies should focus on working with landowners and farmers to improve habitat quality, water quality and the availability of breeding ponds to maximise connectivity between breeding sites facilitating dispersal. Recommendations are made to conservation practitioners with respect to genetic structuring and identified genetic entities. A major challenge lies in breaching the boundaries between academic research, Government and conservation management decision making and practical on-the-ground conservation action by various stakeholders (principally landowners and farmers) to make conservation programmes more effective and efficient.

A recurrent selective breeding process was developed to assess the suitability and potential of Dactylis glomerata L. (Cocksfoot) for the biorefining of phenolic compounds. Evaluation of traits across wild or synthetic accessions and commercial varieties entered into both replicated and randomised spaced plant and yield plot trials, allowed for a selective half-sib polycross for both the initial and first generation to be performed. Test traits included ploidy level, susceptibility to two fungal pathogens, biomass quality, dry matter yield, winter hardiness, date of emergence of inflorescences and analysis of the phenolic profile of the species. Winter hardiness, emergence of inflorescences and incidence of Mastigosporium sp. and Puccinia striiformis were assessed through spaced plant observations, ploidy level via chromosome counts and flow cytometry, biomass quality through NIRS, dry matter yield by weights of plot samples and phenolic profile by GC-MS. Differences between initial generations revealed that improvement of pathogen resistance could be achieved through selective breeding, although testing over further generations would be needed to greater assess other traits. Dry matter yield was greater than Lolium perenne L. over a spring-autumn cutting regime, with digestibility remaining consistent across these seasons. Water-soluble carbohydrates within leaf tissues decreased between spring and autumn, whilst protein contents increased, indicating protein could make a suitable additional biorefining product. Phenolic profile was not unique to accessions, nor greatly influenced by fluctuations in dry matter yield, instead being greater affected by season. Estimated income from the biorefining of phenolic compounds per hectare across a spring-autumn monthly cutting regime could make a significant contribution to annual livestock income in Wales, with flavonoid compounds offering the greatest potential.

Understanding the ecology of large carnivores in increasingly complex, multi-use conservation landscapes is crucial for their effective conservation in 21st century Africa, as is determining which management strategies can reconcile conservation with economic growth and human development. Reliable population monitoring techniques are essential to achieve both these goals. This thesis aims to address key knowledge gaps in the above themes, through a study of an intact large carnivore guild in Tanzania's Ruaha-Rungwa landscape. First, I apply occupancy modelling to sign-based data to investigate the distribution and habitat use of large carnivores, their prey, and human activity across the complex, at multiple spatial scales (Chapter 3). I show that species are limited by anthropogenic, management, and biotic factors, revealing the importance of integrated research and conservation planning for large carnivore management. I also identify a novel threat to Tanzania's biodiversity, in the form of increased habitat degradation associated with trophy hunting block abandonment. To investigate interspecific interactions within the large carnivore guild, I then apply conditional co-occupancy models to the same dataset, again for multiple species and at multiple scales (Chapter 4). I find that African wild dog (Lycaon pictus) avoid lion (Panthera leo) at both coarser and finer spatial scales, with effects being strongest in disturbed areas. Findings indicate that interspecific pressures can have a strong influence on the habitat use of large carnivores in multi-use landscapes, and must be appreciated in conservation planning. To then complement these insights with finer-scale metrics, I apply spatially explicit capture-recapture (SECR) models to camera trap data to investigate the effects of habitat and land management strategies on lion population density (Chapter 5). Lion exist at highest densities in well-protected, prey-rich environments, including in community-managed areas, and at intermediate densities in miombo woodlands and in trophy hunting areas. I show that the method employed has the potential to be an important tool for lion population management. In Chapter 6, I use a range of data to provide insights into the status of Ruaha-Rungwa's cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) population. Findings reveal an extension of known geographical range for the species, and provide some of the first evidence that miombo woodlands may be important for cheetah across its eastern African range. I also show that collaborations with tourism operators hold potential for cheetah population monitoring, and I identify regional research priorities for the species. Finally, I contextualise my findings by reviewing two decades of peer-reviewed African large carnivore population assessments, and identifying trends, biases, and opportunities in research (Chapter 7). I find that studies are biased towards southern and eastern Africa, particularly South Africa and Kenya, and that population assessments are significantly positively biased towards lion, and significantly negatively biased against striped hyaena (Hyaena hyaena). Most populations are understudied, and opportunities exist for research on most species and in most countries, and for increased inclusion of local authors and capacity building in range countries. Overall, the collective findings of this thesis highlight the necessity for increasingly integrated and synthetic research, as heterogeneity and complexity of conservation systems increases, and for an increased appreciation of the effects of anthropogenic impacts on large carnivores, even within protected areas. They also show that conserving large carnivore guilds will require robust population monitoring, and, more broadly, a shift towards more inclusive approaches to conservation that can secure wildlife without sacrificing human well-being and socio-economic development.

Coastal marine environments are important ecological, economic and social areas providing valuable services such as coastal protection, areas of recreation and tourism, fishing, climate regulation, biotic materials and biofuels. Marine renewable energy developments in the coastal environment are becoming a key objective for many countries globally. Assessing and monitoring the impacts of these developments on features, such as coastal biodiversity, becomes a difficult prospect in these environments due to the complexity of marine process at the locations in which these developments are targeted. This thesis explores the main challenges faced when assessing biodiversity in dynamic coastal environments, in particular those susceptible to high levels of turbidity. Various underwater camera techniques were trialled in reduced visibility environments including baited remote underwater video (BRUV), drop-down video and hydroacoustic methods. This research successfully refined BRUV guidelines in the North-East Atlantic region and identified key methodological and environmental factors influencing data collected BRUV deployments. Key findings included mackerel as the recommended bait type in this region and highlighting the importance of collecting consistent metadata when using these methods. In areas of high turbidity, clear liquid optical chambers (CLOCs) were successfully used to enhance the quality of information gathered using underwater cameras when monitoring benthic fauna and fish assemblages. CLOCs were applied to both conventional BRUV camera systems and benthic drop-down camera systems. Improvements included image quality, species and habitat level identification, and taxonomic richness. Evaluations of the ARIS 3000 imaging sonar and its capability of visualising distinguishing identifying features in low visibility environments for motile fauna showed mixed results with morphologically distinct species such as elasmobranchs much clearer in the footage compared to individuals belonging to finfish families. A combined approach of optical and hydroacoustic camera methods may be most suitable for adequately assessing coastal biodiversity in low visibility environments.

Globally, hundreds of thousands of wildlife rangers patrol wide areas within protected areas every day, observing biodiversity and illegal activities. Data collection by rangers therefore has enormous potential to track changes in biodiversity and threats to it, at scale and with little additional cost. However, ranger patrols are biased in space and time and detections are imperfect, so what rangers observe may not capture underlying reality well. Furthermore, even when monitoring results are reliable, they might not be used effectively to inform conservation management. Effective ranger-based monitoring also requires active engagement by the people collecting and using data (rangers and managers). In this Thesis I investigated factors affecting (a) the reliability of ranger-based monitoring data and, (b) the effective use of these data within conservation management. I used the monitoring and management of elephant poaching in the Mana-Chewore World Heritage Site, Zimbabwe, as a case study and combined statistical, mathematical, and qualitative methods. I began with a participatory modelling approach in which rangers and managers helped me to build and evaluate models of the spatial distribution of elephant poaching in Mana-Chewore, with statistical methods to account for patrol bias. Combining quantitative models and interview responses allowed for more robust inference in the face of uncertainty, with proximity to water emerging as the strongest driver of poaching (reflecting both poacher and elephant behaviour). Next, I developed mathematical simulations to quantify how patrol characteristics (effort, spatial coverage, etc.) interacted with poaching dynamics to affect the power of ranger-collected data to detect underlying spatial and temporal trends in poaching. Power to detect trends was low in many scenarios, with some non-intuitive results (such as spatially targeted patrols achieving power similar to spatially random patrols). Strategies required to achieve robust results depended heavily on monitoring objectives (the magnitude of change in poaching that managers wish to detect, for example). To complement these quantitative insights, I interviewed 23 rangers working in Mana-Chewore to investigate their perceptions of patrol-based data collection. I found that their occupational culture (including a strong sense of duty and deference to authority), as well as their awareness of how their data were used, shaped their engagement with monitoring. In a second qualitative analysis, I interviewed nine park managers and 17 senior staff of the national wildlife authority to investigate the extent to which ranger-collected data were used to inform anti-poaching. Managers valued and made basic use of ranger-collected poaching data but did not systematically analyse trends in these data to inform their anti-poaching strategies. Managers felt that management based on intuition, experience and more reactive data-use was more familiar and dependable, and therefore did not embrace data-based adaptive management. For ranger-based monitoring to contribute effectively to biodiversity conservation, practitioners and scientists must acknowledge, understand, and account for uncertainty in both monitoring data and the behaviour of those collecting and using it. Clearly defining monitoring and trend detection goals and critically evaluating the likelihood of achieving these goals is essential, as is meaningfully engaging the perspectives of rangers and managers. More generally, this research demonstrates the importance of interdisciplinarity in the study of socio-ecological systems, and the power of models for both understanding and dealing with the uncertainty inherent in these systems.

Biodiversity is declining on a global scale despite efforts to the contrary. Birds are effective indicators of ecosystem health, occurring in almost every habitat on Earth. However, many UK birds have declined since the 1960s, and are now classified as endangered or rare. Knowledge of factors influencing the presence and abundance of such species is therefore vital for their conservation. Habitat diversity affects avian diversity attesting that birds are a vital resource to conservationists. Not only are breeding birds influenced directly by their immediate habitat, they are also indirectly affected by the surrounding landscape, indicating the need for local and landscape-level studies and management. This study takes a multi-scale approach to examine the consequences of habitat and landscape changes on bird populations in two contrasting and mixed land-use sites: heathland and woodland in the New Forest (Hampshire) and arable farmland with scattered woodlands in Cambridgeshire. Recently acquired, high resolution airborne remote sensing datasets (Light Detection and Ranging, LiDAR) were used to develop metrics that quantified vegetation structure within the two study landscapes. These variables, together with vegetation composition (recorded from field surveys) were examined in relation to a series of bird indices (density, species richness, diversity, number of declining species, conservation priority, and rarity), as species richness and diversity alone can mask effects on more vulnerable species. Relationships with bird community composition and the habitat variables were also investigated using Multidimensional Scaling (MDS). Although bird communities are known to differ between broad habitat classifications, this has not explicitly been quantified. The results from these two studies were used to predict the effects of landscape change on the bird indices and to identify the bird species affected, with a view to providing management recommendations for the relevant authorities. The most diverse habitat in the New Forest for bird species was the scrubland (despite low bird density), represented by a positive relationship with scrubby vegetation variables, such as the percent cover of vegetation at 2-5 m and height Vertical Distribution Ratio (VDR). Beech woodlands supported the greatest number of declining bird species. Pine was overall poor bird habitat, signified by a negative relationship of the percent cover of pine with the majority of the bird indices. Other conifer was positively related to the Index of Relative Rarity (IRR), and supported the rare Firecrest. Heathland also had a high IRR value on account of the rare Dartford Warbler, supported by a positive relationship with the percent cover of heather, indicating that alternative habitats to those that increase diversity were extremely important to habitat specialists. The habitat associations of these bird species were confirmed by the MDS analysis. Furthermore, the MDS also showed that although poor in terms of the bird indices, pine provided habitat for other rare and declining birds, including Common Crossbills. Woodland edges in Cambridgeshire were the most diverse for bird species (a 'classic' edge effect), but which conversely resulted in adjacent fields being poor bird habitat. The MDS analysis showed that corvids were strongly associated with these edge habitats creating an exclusion zone. An increase in the proportional length of woody hedge vegetation in field boundaries supported more declining bird species than the other habitats. Hedges also increased (and were positively related with) the majority of the bird indices in the field-only analysis. Rarity and IRR were positively related to variables depicting woodland vegetation (percent cover of oak and vegetation height), suggesting that rare birds, such as Marsh Tits or Ravens, were in taller oak woodlands. Furthermore, a negative relationship of rarity with wood area suggests that the woodlands were sufficiently interconnected over the Cambridgeshire landscape to allow populations to persist. Overall, the MDS results showed that in both landscapes, bird community composition was more similar between the woodlands and most dissimilar between the non-woodland habitats. However, once separated, the woodlands were found to vary by vegetation composition (and habitat class) in the New Forest and by particular vegetation species and structure (scrubbier vs taller woodlands) in Cambridgeshire. Predictions of landscape change, such as scrub removal, in the New Forest, reduced bird density, and would also reduce bird diversity, and affect scrub preferring species such as Willow Warblers. Pine removal would increase many of the bird indices, but would affect conifer specialists, Common Crossbills and Wood Warblers. Beech decline locally was predicted to reduce the number of declining bird species supported, affecting the Hawfinch population. In Cambridgeshire, declines in hedge length would reduce the number of declining bird species supported (e.g. Yellowhammers), and most of the bird indices over this agricultural landscape. The spread of improved grass would reduce species richness and diversity, and increase corvid density. Declines in oak and tree height, through tree disease or felling, would reduce the number of rare species in the woodlands, including Marsh Tits. Contrasting habitat composition, structure and configuration of both the woodland and non-woodland habitats in these two landscapes, results in contrasting bird indices and community composition. Unsurprisingly, the New Forest was overall better for birds, however, Cambridgeshire supported bird species that were absent from the New Forest, such as the extremely rare and declining Turtle Dove. Bird species habitat preferences also differed between the landscapes, for example, the Goldfinch was associated with conifer in the New Forest, but with hedges in agricultural Cambridgeshire. These two landscape studies had the same conclusions; biodiversity should not be taken alone to measure habitat health as this often masks trends in rare and declining species, as represented by metrics detailing the number of declining bird species, species priority, rarity, IRR and community composition, being related to different habitat variables. This leads on to the second conclusion; that landscape heterogeneity is vital to maintain gamma diversity by providing habitat for as many species as possible. Thus, conservation should be targeted at a landscape scale and incorporate all bird measures, including conservation priority, rarity and community composition as well as diversity.

This study explores the fourth genre, creative nonfiction, as the means to retell the stories of lived experiences. The aim of the study was to gather stories of ordinary people working to conserve orang-utans in Sarawak through in-depth interviews based on narrative inquiry principles, and then to re-tell the stories by crafting a creative nonfiction artefact composed of different subgenres such as Shorts, Portraits, Literary Journalism, hybrid nonfiction pieces and stories partially or wholly told in the participants' own voices in a subgenre that the narrative inquirer-writer identified and named the Crafted Interview. Nineteen individuals were identified and interviewed, using semi-structured interview questions that allowed for digressions, follow-up questions and gentle probing with empathy and understanding by the researcher. Not just a detached observer, the researcher was a participant involved in orang-utan conversation, with a background in journalism and conservation, close to the research participants and their work. She became the interviewer as research instrument and a collaborator in the interviews, gathering stories - the lived experiences of participants through in-depth interviews. The product of the study, the creative nonfiction artefact, tells stories in various nonfiction subgenres spanning fifty years of orang-utan conservation in Sarawak. Through this montage of stories, the narrative inquirer-writer re-tells the storied lives of men and women who have worked in orang-utan conservation in different capacities. These were "ordinary" people, not privileged Western primatologists, but the individuals on the ground, doing their daily work as forest guards and keepers, wildlife biologists and researchers, eco-tour operator and fundraiser for wildlife rehabilitation each contributing to the long-term survival of the iconic primate in its wild habitats or to the orphaned orang-utans that had been confiscated from poachers or illegal exotic pet owners. These stories reflect not just work to save the endangered species, but also the larger issue of species extinction. It is acknowledged that though important, this study has focused only on a small population of orang-utans found in Sarawak; there are other populations in Borneo and Sumatra threatened by human avarice and ignorance. The human species' lack of humanity is evident in the lives of the orphaned orang-utans and the semi-wild animals that cling to a tenuous life in a tiny patch of forest in the middle of human settlements. This leads us to the final level of meaning and understanding; that the human species may be forcing itself into extinction. We exist in a large ecosystem; our fate inextricably linked to that of our cousin, the red ape. While it teeters on the brink of extinction, we realise that we could soon follow suit. Despite the naysayers who believe that reading as a pleasurable pastime will soon disappear, the future of the creative nonfiction seems promising; it will thrive in both traditional and new forms as writers and readers alike continue to "hunger for the real." The future of the orang-utan is not so clear-cut. What is evident is that species conservation is a real need around the world. More creative projects beckon, appealing to us to research and write imaginatively, telling true stories, to support other endangered species and to share the stories of men and women toiling to save them on this uneven battlefield. This is a baton we can and should take up; the spark has been lit and this is a flame that needs to keep burning.

European bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) is a commercially and recreationally important finfish native to the Northeast Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea. The species is targeted throughout its range and represents a significant commercial and recreational fishery, which in the UK are estimated to have a value of £5-6million at first sale, and £100-200 million per year respectively. In 2010, the International Council for Exploration of the Seas (ICES) reported a dramatic decline in the Northeast Atlantic stock (ICES divisions 4.b-c, 7.a, and 7.d-h), which in 2016 declined below "safe biological limits". In 2019 ICES reported that the Northeast Atlantic stock increased above Blim, however relative to historic levels the population remains in a highly impoverished state and is still below maximum sustainable yield thresholds. Due to the local economic and social significance of European bass fisheries, the Devon and Severn Inshore Fisheries and Conservation Authority (D&S IFCA) co-funded and co-supervised the current PhD with the University of Plymouth to investigate; the feasibility of localised management/conservation policies to improve local European bass populations. Due to the localized/restricted movement characteristics and estuarine dependence of this species, the PhD project was focussed on identifying; movement, feeding and growth within estuarine habitats, with a particular emphasis on measuring the effectiveness of designated Bass Nursery Areas within the D&S IFCA's district. The results from this thesis demonstrate that estuaries and coastal embayments have been subjected to substantial alteration as a result of human activities. This has resulted in an estimated net loss of 2, 482.9km2 of intertidal habitat historically, with this loss estimated to continue at a rate of 0.2% per year. European bass specifically are thought to utilize intertidal habitats e.g. saltmarsh, as a primary feeding habitat within the first year. Analysis of growth variability from three coastal nursery sites, indicated that factors influencing growth within the first year may have important implications for latter growth and corresponding recruitment. It was therefore recommended that the habitat requirements of European bass should be integrated within management policies. Using acoustic telemetry, European bass were also recorded displaying spatially restricted movement characteristics, and were estimated to occupy an area of < 4.7km2 for 42.9-75.5% of the year (depending on tagging location). These results, combined with the wider literature, suggest that a regionalized fisheries management approach may be appropriate for this species. Presence/absence of European bass within coastal sites in response to environmental variables also demonstrated that site characteristics can fundamentally influence local fish residency characteristics. Notably, within sites with limited freshwater input e.g. coastal rias and/or natural harbours, European bass may maintain residency throughout winter. Therefore seasonal protection/management within designated nursery sites may not be relevant to the behaviour of local European bass populations.

In the context of profound socio-ecological change that has come to define the present Anthropocene moment, a suite of voluntary and state-orchestrated environmental policies known as biodiversity offsetting have become increasingly widespread during the last decade. The allure of such schemes can be understood to lie in their purported ability to reconcile the historically conflictual relationship between economic development and environmental conservation. Policies of this ilk are designed to deliver the provision of ‘additional’ environmental gains, which are framed as balancing out the ecological degradation tied to economic growth. Based on secondary document analysis and semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders, this thesis explores the formulation, implementation, and regulation of a national system of biodiversity offsetting in the context of Colombia. In 2012, in the shadow of an extractivist based economy, the Colombian environment ministry sought to put in place a national framework organized around the notions of ‘no net loss’ to biodiversity and ‘ecological equivalence’ between loss and gain. Drawing on a conceptual framework broadly situated within the field of political ecology, this thesis examines the policy as a set of political, economic, ecological, and socio-cultural relations that conjoin to define the roll out of offsetting in one of the most biologically diverse nation states on Earth. Despite the intentions of an alliance of non-governmental organizations and formal state institutions involved in formulating the policy, concrete implementation with offsets has so far been extremely limited. In deploying insights from strategic-relational state theory, I argue that the formulation of the policy and its slow rate of implementation reflect the strategic manoeuvring of social forces based within and beyond formal state institutions, who seek to advance organizational interests within the framework of the policy process. Over the course of this thesis, I also explore the intellectual and cultural labour required to establish Colombian natures as equivalent. In examining the application of the discursive frames deployed during this process, I argue that Colombia’s specific agrarian political economy and lack of formalized land titles have also served to frustrate the realization of offsets on the ground. Finally, in contrast to existing analyses of biodiversity offsetting, which have largely explored such systems based on processes of privatization, I demonstrate how current implementation within the Colombian system is premised on a contrasting dynamic, where the realization of offsets is in part defined by the nationalization of private land, as regulated private firms move to buy up territory which then becomes the property of formal state institutions.

Migratory freshwater fish populations have declined 76% over the last 40 years. One of the major contributors to this decline is the fragmentation of rivers by cross-channel structures like weirs and dams. These structures do not only alter riverine habitat by deepening and slowing the velocity of water upstream of the structure, which can result in changes to aquatic animal assemblages, but they also act as barriers to animal movement. The impact of weirs with associated fishways (commonly installed to mitigate against barriers to movement) on the upstream migratory behaviour of freshwater fishes was quantified in this thesis using telemetry techniques. Weirs were found to cause significant delay, with passage often being significantly related to river stage where most passage occurred when the weirs were fully submerged. Fish were observed travelling back downstream after encountering a weir, increasing their energy expenditure and likely reducing their reproductive fitness as a result. Delays to migration and increased energy expenditure may become exacerbated in rivers which are heavily fragmented. Experiments carried out in this thesis identified that weirs may select for larger individuals that have a greater probability of passage success. Fishways theoretically alleviate selective pressure, and fishway designs were shown to enable passage of smaller fish. However, fishways may continue to act as selective filters for phenotypic trait as a result of poor attraction efficiency due to fishway placement (e.g. entrance built adjacent to the riverbank, not the area of greatest discharge) and low attraction flow. This highlights the importance of considering where to place fishway entrances. Furthermore, certain behavioural traits may be selected for by fishways. Passage behaviours and success at fishways varies between individuals, and may be partially driven by differences in individual behavioural traits. Bolder and more active individuals were found to have an increased chance of passage success, and were observed to make fewer passage attempts. Given the high cost of installing fishways, it is important that they function to their best ability in order to mitigate the effects of weirs and accommodate all behavioural and phenotypic traits.

Protected areas are essential to conservation. They are expected to safeguard the wildlife and their habitat, so it is important to investigate their effects on species' population and ecology. Creating a protected area can also affect local people. Positive effects can include the preservation of ecosystem services and eco-tourism, with job opportunities and increased infrastructure stemming from such socio-economic development. On the other hand, forest protection often restricts the use of natural resources, thus interfering with traditional livelihoods and local economics. These negative effects can lead to antagonistic attitudes towards the protected area, which can undermine conservation efforts. Understanding the implications of forest protection for the livelihoods local people, along with their attitudes towards, and acceptance or opposition of forest protection can help mitigate the risks of social conflict and support conservation success. In this study, I investigated how forest protection affected the ecology of red-collared brown lemurs (Eulemur collaris) in two littoral forests in southeastern Madagascar (Sainte Luce, Mandena). Since 1999, 14 behavioural studies have been conducted on this lemur species in these littoral forests, focusing on their diet, behaviour, activity pattern, and ranging. As protected areas were established in both Sainte Luce (in 2005) and Mandena (in 2002), I examined whether the previously observed differences have persisted. I also explored local ecological knowledge about this lemur, the impacts of forest protection on local livelihoods, and perceptions of forest protection and several stakeholders. I collected data between August 2017 and October 2018. To assess lemur diet and ranging, I collected data from three groups via focal animal instantaneous sampling (diurnally), and auditory group sampling (nocturnally). To examine the relationship between lemur presence and forest regeneration, I compared the numbers of seedlings and saplings in fragments in which this lemur was present and absent. To understand how forest protection affected local people, I surveyed 60 adults using a semi-structured interview. Similar to the results of previous studies, this study confirms that Eulemur collaris is frugivorous year-round. While Mandena lemurs were previously reported to have larger and more fragmented home ranges than the lemurs in Sainte Luce, in this study, Mandena lemurs' home range was smaller and less fragmented. Lemurs consumed more fruit and showed higher dietary diversity in the wet season. Their defecation was related to their resting patterns. Fragments with Eulemur collaris regenerated more. Most participants had a positive attitude towards Eulemur collaris and did not hunt it. Plant species were used locally as timber, medicine and fuelwood. Eulemur collaris consumed 52 utilitarian species. Perceptions of tourism and the NGO were largely positive, while perceptions of mining and forest protection were mixed due to their negative impacts on traditional livelihoods. This study shows forest protection has impacted both lemurs and people. Emphasising their interdependence might benefit both, and help preserve traditional livelihoods. As 98 % of lemurs and 70 % of primates are threatened, monitoring how conservation measures affect them is important. The urgency to conserve biodiversity should be matched with the urgency to document and conserve the cultural heritage associated with it.

Conflict with humans over livestock is a major threat to lion (Panthera leo) populations across their range in Africa. Lions kill livestock, a major source of livelihood for marginalised communities, and farmers kill lions in return. How to effectively mitigate this conflict remains a major conservation challenge till this day. In this thesis, I evaluate the effectiveness of the Long Shields Community Guardian programme (in short: Long Shields programme), a community-based, non-lethal human-lion conflict intervention that seeks to mitigate the impacts from lions by encouraging farmers to adopt behaviours that reduce the risk of livestock depredation. Specially, I examine (a) baseline attitudes towards lions and lion conservation; (b) attitudes towards lions before and after the implementation of the Long Shields programme; (c) trends in livestock losses to lions before and after the implementation of the Long Shields programme, and (d) barriers that prevented the adoption of the Long Shields programme. My results reveal that farmers' attitudes towards lions are strongly negative and seem to be influenced by perceived losses rather than the actual losses to lions. Attitudes varied based on the geographic location where the farmer lived as well as the farmer's ethnic group (Chapter 2). Subsequently, I detected a positive shift in attitudes of farmers that were part of the Long Shields programme (i.e., treatment group), including those that were part of the control group but exchanged information with their peers in the treatment group, than those of farmers in the control group (Chapter 3). My results also revealed that farmers that were part of the Long Shields programme experienced a significant reduction (up to 40%) in livestock loss to lions since the start of this programme in 2013, compared to the period 2008-2012 before the programme was initiated, while livestock losses increased for farmers that were not part of this programme. The number of lions killed annually due to retaliatory killing by farmers also declined by 41% since the implementation of the programme in 2013 (Chapter 4). My results also revealed that although the Long Shields programme was effective and well perceived by the majority of participants, a minority of farmers in the programme area continued to suffer higher livestock losses to lions than did others. Continuance of higher livestock losses to lions, despite all efforts from the programme personnel, seemed to be influenced by various barriers such as poor communication, negative attitudes towards the programme, and lack of trust in the programme itself, and in some cases, the programme personnel (Chapter 5). Although here we focus on human-lion conflict, our evaluation design and overall findings are applicable to other human-carnivore conflicts situations in other areas.

Illegal and/or unsustainable wildlife trade affects wildlife globally. To address this issue, a plethora of demand reduction efforts have been carried out. However, shortcomings in behaviour change interventions targeting wildlife consumers have been widely noted, and these likely compromise conservationists' capacities to assess, and stem, unsustainable use of wildlife. In disciplines, such as public health, which include behavioural approaches, behaviour change interventions have been extensively implemented and offer useful insights for addressing wildlife trade. Thus, for this thesis I aimed to design, implement, and evaluate an evidence-based behaviour change intervention that robustly applies relevant approaches found in behavioural science-informed disciplines to the field of wildlife trade. For this work I targeted saiga horn usage in Singapore. The saiga (Saiga tatarica) is a Critically Endangered antelope from Central Asia whose horn is used in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) to treat fever and heatiness (a TCM state of illness with symptoms like cough). Chapter 2 shows that not only is saiga horn commonly used in Singapore, but that many Chinese Singaporeans consider saiga horn a product option they use most often; and that middle-aged Chinese Singaporean women are among the largest consumers and are the most likely to purchase saiga horn for other people. Perceived efficacy and recommendations from others, are the top stated reasons for using saiga horn. Chapter 3 highlights that there are many interlinked influences affecting saiga horn usage among middle-aged Chinese Singaporean women, and that some of these influences, particularly related to their societal-level perspectives and health information sources, would be important and feasible to leverage in a behaviour change intervention. Chapter 4 details the implementation of a carefully disseminated, socially-framed, online intervention targeting saiga horn usage among middle-aged Chinese Singaporean women. This chapter shows how concepts around repeat message exposure, news spread, and social reinforcement were employed to produce positive immediate online audience response to an intervention message. Chapter 5 reveals how the highly pervasive online intervention resulted in some measurable behavioural impacts on middle-aged Chinese Singaporean women's usage of saiga horn, as well as impacts on their awareness of saiga antelopes. Though this chapter also discusses heterogeneity in impact, where limitations arose in the intervention, and where relevant future research could improve upon this work. Chapter 6 looks at how this thesis ties with wider discourse around behaviour change interventions in demand reduction, how conservationists can improve this arena, and some potential directions for future research on this study system. In sum, this thesis helps to fill a key gap in our understanding of effective, evidence-based, large-scale approaches that can be feasibly implemented to induce change among unsustainable wildlife trade consumers.

With increasing awareness of the scope for social science techniques to be tools for delivering conservation impact, it is timely that conservation psychology be developed as an applied discipline. In seeking to understand why people behave in the ways that they do, tools and techniques from applied psychology can be used to encourage pro-conservation behaviour, and emphasising these practical outputs is key to the urgently needed wider uptake of this currently fringe discipline. At present, few studies within the field of conservation research adopt social psychology frameworks and apply them to in situ conservation problems. This is a damaging omission: as a discipline which revolves around the many undesirable outcomes of human behaviour, conservation would do well to capitalise upon these approaches. Currently, good, clear examples of the application of social psychology frameworks to conservation problems, to serve as guides or blueprints for developing the subject, are rare. The aim of this thesis is to use select concepts which have been shown to effectively articulate the reasons behind human behaviour, and apply them to conservation problems in eastern and southern Africa. Focussing on livestock management, predation, and land management issues, I use a social psychology framework to explore the reasons underlying certain conservation-relevant behaviours, and identify how these behaviours might be influenced to achieve conservation ends. I show that a simple theory of planned behaviour framework can explain variation in livestock management behaviour across a socially and ecologically diverse landscape in southern Kenya. I also show that attitudes and social norms, independently, have significant impacts on peoples' behaviour. Furthering this line of enquiry, I demonstrate that the structure of social norms regarding predators and livestock predation are consistent between Kenya and Zimbabwe. Intervention tools using social norms may therefore be applied in a variety of contexts with minimal adaptation, and are consequently suitable for non-expert use. In a final social-norm focussed study in Kenya, I use a quasi- experimental approach to illustrate how norms can be influenced using relatively simple priming techniques, and that these manipulations impact behavioural intention. Together these results demonstrate that social norms are 1) impactful on behaviour, 2) highly conserved, and therefore common approaches can be used across a wide area, and 3) flexible, and can be influenced with relatively basic interventions. I conclude that social norms may provide an easy target for behavioural conservation interventions, and practitioners should consider whether social norms can be used to guide the behaviour of human populations in a range of conservation conflicts. I also examine the sub-structure of attitudes, and conclude that straightforward approaches can be used to break down the 'attitudes' concept into meaningful sub-units; when designing interventions, practitioners may wish to target these sub-components to increase intervention efficacy. Together, this thesis demonstrates that conservation psychology can be a highly applied discipline, and it is only through lack of use by conservation scientists that its many offerings have, until now, been little known in applied conservation practice (although fully recognised in other disciplines such as education and human healthcare). Although this thesis is a brief glimpse into the various useful approaches to behaviour change which may emerge from correct application of social psychology techniques, I hope that my results will encourage future researchers and practitioners that this is an exciting, emerging field which will richly reward far greater emphasis in the sphere of wildlife conservation.

The existence of life on earth as we know it relies on a diversity of life. Biodiversity underpins vital ecosystems services globally, at all spatial scales, and yet is being lost at an alarming rate. Current extinction rates are estimated to be 100-1000 times higher than the typical background rates observed in the fossil record, with anthropogenic influences being the major driving force. It is therefore widely accepted that biodiversity must be protected. Spatial tools, such as protected areas, are increasingly employed to meet conservation objectives. Despite continuing developments in spatial conservation methods, a fundamental aspect of biodiversity remains largely ignored, namely evolutionary processes. Evolution is the process that generates and maintains biodiversity. However, examples of where evolutionary considerations have been explicitly incorporated into spatial conservation planning remain rare, with metrics such as species richness (which ignore differences in evolutionary distinctiveness between species) more often used. This work aims to address this by focusing on the inclusion of phylogenetic diversity (PD), which measures evolutionary diversity by summing the branch lengths joining a species, or set of species, into protected area planning. A review of the literature revealed that there has been a huge increase, an average 80% increase per year in the last five years, in research around the conservation of PD. However, studies where PD has been specifically included into current spatial conservation practices, namely by incorporating PD into spatial optimisation analyses using tools such as MARXAN, remain rare, although this is changing. There is also a need for further investigation into whether species richness can act as an effective surrogate metric for PD. The dominant approach to incorporate PD into protected area planning, identified in the literature review, is to use phylogenetic tree branches as conservation features, weighted in accordance to their length. This approach, which is referred to here as the "weighted branch-based approach", was used in a new case study on primates, using MARXAN, to compare the priority areas identified for the conservation of PD with those identified using species-based targets. Large spatial mismatches were found between planning outputs based on PD when compared to outputs based on species, although this was influenced by the availability of area, with the largest mispatches found when area was limited most. No major difference was observed between the amount of PD captured by a PD-based approach versus the amount captured by a species-based approach, suggesting that species richness may be a suitable surrogate metric for PD. Potential issues associated with constraining a planning process in order to account for PD, e.g. getting MARXAN to solve a problem (maximum coverage) that is different to one it was designed to solve (minimum set), provided the impetus to seek a new methodology that accounts for PD while still maintaining MARXAN's core functionality. This novel method, which maximises PD though the optimised selection of species that can then act as conservation features to set coverage targets for, was tested using a case study for three mammalian orders (Artiodactyla, Carnivora, and Primates). The results of this case study show that differences in PD between species can be used to select sets of species that maximise overall PD within a spatial conservation planning exercise, without the use of penalties or thresholds that are required in a weighted branch-based approach. Despite heated debate, few studies have tried to empirically investigate the impact of changes in species-level taxonomy due to the use of different species concepts (and specifically the use of the Phylogenetic Species Concept [PSC], which tends to recognise more species than other commonly-used concepts) on the conservation of biodiversity. The final research element of this work specifically addresses this gap in knowledge by presenting the first study to analyse the impact of changes in species-level taxonomy on a PD-informed spatial conservation plan, using African bovid species (gazelles, antelopes etc.) as a case study. PD-informed spatial conservation planning has been argued to be relatively unaffected by changes in species-level taxonomy. However, the results presented here show that, while the amount of area required does not change, there are substantial impacts on the location of spatial conservation plans for African bovid species, depending on whether or not a PSC-based species-level taxonomy is used. Collectively, this thesis shows that PD can be successfully incorporated into conservation planning and that it has a major impact on spatial planning outcomes, particularly when resources (in this case, area) are limited. Based on these findings, there is a clear need for future research to investigate the potential for some metrics, for which data may be more readily available e.g. species richness, to act as surrogates for other metrics that capture important dimensions of biodiversity e.g. PD; and that in combination with surrogates there is a need for more integrated approaches to conservation that account for the multidimensional characteristics of biodiversity, as well as further investigation into the implications of taxonomy for biodiversity conservation.

Lowland calcareous grassland (chalk grassland) has suffered extensive habitat loss and fragmentation in the UK over the past century. Outside of Salisbury Plain - the largest remnant area of chalk grassland in Europe - most patches of chalk grassland are now small and spatially isolated, with the median patch size currently less than two hectares. Extensive habitat restoration is needed if we are to conserve species-rich chalk grassland communities. However, this will be difficult to achieve in the densely-populated and intensively-farmed chalk landscapes of Southern England. Therefore, innovative solutions for restoring chalk grassland need to be identified and implemented. In this thesis, I suggest focusing restoration efforts within and along National Trails could be one such approach. In Chapter 2, I identify a number of characteristics of National Trails that make them suitable as a target for conservation resources. I concentrate on three National Trails (The Ridgeway, North Downs Way and South Downs Way) that extend through the chalk landscapes of Southern England - finding that these trails are important for reducing the isolation of remnant fragments of chalk grassland and that increasing the width of well-managed verge habitat along these trails could increase habitat connectivity. In Chapter 3, I drone-map and survey the verges of The Ridgeway. Using this data, I find that the trail currently has an important role in maintaining chalk grassland connectivity and that small areas of targeted habitat restoration along the trail could drive large increases in connectivity. In Chapter 4, I examine a range of management interventions that could be used to restore grassland verges along National Trails. I find that a mixture of simple management approaches can restore species-rich chalk grassland verges within a short timeframe. Overall, these results suggest that focusing conservation efforts along National Trails could improve the connectivity of chalk landscapes while simultaneously delivering a range of public benefits.

A complex nexus of concerns is often attendant upon cases of international trade in wildlife products. Concerns may include: species conservation, livelihoods, personal freedoms, animal welfare, and politics. Regulatory decision-making regarding wildlife trade is rarely straight-forward, given the multitude of (often conflicting) perspectives manifest in such debates. The international trade in African lion (Panthera leo) skeletons, of which over 6000 have been legally exported from South Africa to Asia since 2008, is used as a case study of a multi-faceted contemporary wildlife trade debate. This thesis examines the lion skeleton trade debate both for insight into public decision-making in wildlife trade regulation and with the aim of contributing empirical information to further understanding of the trade in lion skeletons and body-parts. The thesis begins analysis of the lion skeleton trade in Chapter 1 by outlining major arguments present in the lion skeleton debate and demonstrates the inherently ethical nature of the debate, whilst showing how the use of formal argument analysis can provide clarity in public decision-making. To achieve this Chapter 1 details 10 generalisable lessons that can be applied to any ethical analysis. Through argument analysis a number of empirical information gaps in lion trade debate arguments were identified. Three of these gaps are addressed in the thesis' central chapters. Firstly, in Chapter 2, I investigate preferences for lion or tiger (P. tigris) bone wine products from farmed or wild sources amongst the urban public in the consumer countries of China and Vietnam, and tested for the effect of demographic and attitudinal variables on those preferences for bone wines. Results indicate that tiger is greatly preferred over lion and that for second choices of bone wine product respondents will elect to switch between species over changing the farmed or wild origin. I discuss the findings in the context of the potential for farmed lion bone to reduce exploitation of wild felids. I then, in Chapter 3, looked to field reports of lion mortalities to assess the extent of targeted illegal killing of wild lions for bones and body parts, and explore trends over time, in two major lion population strongholds: finding that the majority of body part removals were opportunistic and there was no evidence for systemic targeted killings of lions. Finally, in Chapter 4, I focused on concerns surrounding the differentiation of wild from captive-bred lion bone and tested whether an emerging technology, DART mass spectrometry, could be used to distinguish between such sources of lion bone. Preliminary analysis showed that DART mass spectrometry could be used to differentiate between a batch of captive-bred lion bones and a batch of wild bones: indicating that this technology has potential for use in the investigation and regulation of captive-bred lion bone trade. I therefore discuss the results with regard to the enforcement of legal lion bone trade. Following exploration of new empirical information, I return in Chapter 5 to consideration of decision-making and regulation of the lion skeleton trade. I argue that the lion trade debate typifies decision-making under deep uncertainty; whereby conclusions of arguments are rendered perpetually uncertain due to the complexity and unboundedness of the system in question. After the revelation of deep uncertainty I conclude by articulating sets of values which I believe would best benefit from adjudication in the making of future policy decisions regarding lion farming and trade.

In recent years, there has been a rethinking of the role of disturbance regimes in nature conservation: from exceptional and destructive events to be controlled and/or avoided, to key ecological processes to be nurtured and choreographed. These regimes concern the spatiotemporal dynamics of ecological disturbances, understood here as events that disrupt the structure of an ecology, community or population, causing profound changes in an ecosystem. The rethinking of their role precedes but resonates with current enthusiasms for proactive and experimental modes of conservation, such as rewilding. This thesis draws on three case studies (the New Forest, Knepp Castle Estate and Dundreggan Estate) to explore the ontological, epistemic and socio-political implications of rewilding for the governance of forest disturbance regimes in the UK, particularly through the use of large herbivores. Drawing upon relational understandings of nature, space and time, it develops an understanding of disturbance regimes as process and practice. It first examines how rewilding departs from orthodox biopolitical modes of governing life and the ontological politics at the interface between these various modes. To this end, it attends to the ways in which disturbances have been historically understood and how these understandings have come to shape their governance. Second, it explores the knowledge practices through which ecologists and forest managers know and enact disturbances, comparing a traditional 'prescriptive' approach with rewilding. It argues that in practice rewilding is multiple, in contrast to rewilding discourse. Finally, it maps the different and sometimes conflicting social, economic and cultural values associated with working with natural processes, exploring the political ecologies of governing disturbance regimes. It argues that controversies around forest management pertain to a large extent to contrasting perceptions of different types of 'work' within the idea of working landscape and how they are 'naturalised'. In the conclusion, the thesis explores three empirical and conceptual contributions of these findings for those seeking to understand the logics of rewilding and the processes, practices and dynamics by which nonhuman forms and processes are governed in a post-Natural and uncertain future. First, by deploying a relational approach to the governance of disturbance regimes and by focusing on a long-term disturbance, I draw out the relevance of temporality for thinking through and with disturbances as social and ecological processes. Second, by drawing attention to the intertwining of bio- and socio-political regimes, I propose a reframing of (European) rewilded landscapes as working landscapes. Finally, by attending to the intricacies of practice, I argue that rewilding praxis is multiple and hybrid. It often involves compromises and is shaped by past governance histories and the broader political and social context.

The biodiversity crisis demands urgent identification of at-risk species, to ensure timely and focused conservation intervention. Demographic modelling contributes to understanding population responses to threats such as over-exploitation and environmental change, but is hindered by incomplete and biased data and limited understanding of how life cycle processes and life history shape demographic responses. Here, I explore barriers to and opportunities for effective conservation demography, using core life history and modelling principles to address limitations and opportunities presented by existing demographic data sets and by relating demographic responses to life history. I focus on long-lived birds, which include many highly threatened species and may present challenges for modelling because of missing stage-specific data due to aspects of their life cycle and habitat use. In Chapter 2, I develop a two-sex model for monogamous species to explore whether including pairing and divorce processes influences insights from classical conservation analyses. When divorce costs take the form of loss of reproductive output, population dynamics in slow-lived species were largely insensitive to pairing and divorce. In Chapter 3, I use phylogenetic imputation to reconstruct vital rates of survival, growth, and reproduction in avian demographic data for use in conservation analyses. Certain vital rates, such as adult survival, could be imputed relatively accurately based on vital rate covariation, with phylogeny and auxiliary trait data improving estimates in some cases. However, demographic metrics such as generation time were sensitive to the accuracy of imputed vital rates. In Chapter 4, I explore the use of pace of life indicators to assess responses to mortality impacts in seabirds. Pace of life indicators could help to assess risk to seabirds from extrinsic threats, reducing dependency on classical vital rates required to parameterise demographic models. Finally, in Chapter 5, I review the literature on demographic responses to climate in mammals to highlight data gaps and limitations for exploring species' responses to environmental change, revealing geographic and taxonomic biases in missing data and complex demographic responses to climate.

The study of mesopredators, their guilds, and conservation has had little attention in the tropics of Southeast Asia. A particularly interesting group, from the point of view of their ecological community and because of their generally threatened status, is the Felidae. This thesis reports an intensive camera-trapping study of small-medium sized wild felids in the Kerinci Seblat landscape in west-central Sumatra. Samples were drawn from seven study areas across a diversity of habitats occupied by clouded leopard, golden cat, marbled cat, leopard cat, and their prey. The papers comprising this thesis report on the ecology, behaviour, population status and trends, core areas and habitat connectivity of this predator- prey community, and prioritizing conservation in a multi-species management approach. Specifically, this thesis has five main results: (i) revealed spatial and temporal interactions between clouded leopard, golden cat, and their respective prey through performing Bayesian two species occupancy modelling and temporal overlap analyses; (ii) estimated population densities of clouded leopard, in the context of human activities, by implementing Bayesian Spatially Explicit Capture Recapture (SECR) and identified and quantified illegal human activities detected by camera traps; (iii) estimated occupancy states as an indicator of clouded leopard and golden cat population dynamics from consecutive surveys in 2009-11 and 2014-16 and anthropogenic pressures from deforestation in the surrounding areas; and (iv) identified high priority areas within and outside protected area networks through estimating multi-species habitat use and least cost path and kernel density estimate analyses for defining core areas and corridor networks. Integrating these four research themes, this thesis contributes to absent information on the felid mesocarnivores of Sumatra, and offers analytical methodologies for assessing their ecology, behaviour, conservation, and management that can be applied throughout the tropics.

Understanding the mechanisms behind species adaptation and differentiation is a major undertaking in evolutionary biology, particularly in light of advancing threats to biodiversity. Studying species whose current distribution was heavily influenced by glacial periods represent an ideal system to disentangle the effect of historical contingency and demographic history from evolutionary forces, and can provide important clues on how populations can deal with environmental change in the long term. However, there is also a dire need for research focusing on adaptation occurring in a much shorter time scale, as to help conservationists protect endangered populations from fluctuating environmental conditions. This PhD aimed to shed light on the processes of differentiation and adaptation in the European whitefish Coregonus lavaretus in Scotland, focussing on a natural, glacial time scale, and a man-made, recent translocation. In Britain, European whitefish is one of the rarest freshwater species, is considered a glacial relict and presents a patchy distribution across Scotland, England, and Wales. While several studies have focused on the relationship between the British populations, it is still unclear how British population are related to continental European ones, in particular to the three mitochondrial DNA clades previously identified, and whether they come from the same origin. Using a genomic dataset and samples from all seven native British populations and four mainland European and Russian ones, I aimed to reconstruct the evolutionary history and to discern the demographic and evolutionary forces underpinning divergence between British populations. I find lower genetic diversity in the Scottish populations and high differentiation (FST = 0.433 – 0.712) with the British and other European populations. I also find evidence of separate postglacial colonisation of Britain, with the Scottish populations having been separated from the Welsh and English populations for more than 50 Ky. Differentiation was elevated genome-wide, rather than in particular genomic regions, suggesting genetic drift due to the long isolation of the Scottish populations as the main driver of differentiation. In addition, there was discordance between the nuclear and mitochondrial DNA data at the European scale, with the previously reported northern and southern mtDNA clades not being supported by nuclear data. These findings indicate neutral processes and historical contingency to be the drivers of genomic divergence in British populations of European whitefish and shed new light on the establishment of the native British freshwater fauna after the last ice age. Epigenetic processes are one of the mechanisms that can generate phenotypic plasticity, and therefore are particularly relevant to study rapid adaptation. Using a single method to extract genomic and epigenomic information is much more efficient, cheaper and more timesaving than using two separate approaches, which is usually what has been done to date. In Chapter 3, I assessed the possibility of using epiRADseq, a technique originally developed for the study of DNA methylation, to extract genomic SNPs, so that the data obtained from one technique could be used for both genomic and epigenomic analyses. I used previously published data on coral, and generated new data on European whitefish to compare the number of SNPs retained, population genetic summary statistics, and population genetic structure between data drawn from ddRADseq, the genomic equivalent, and epiRADseq library preparations. I showed that SNPs obtained from epiRADseq are highly similar to those from ddRADseq and are equivalent for estimating genetic diversity and population structure. This finding is particularly relevant to researchers interested in genetics and epigenetics on the same individuals because using a single epigenomic approach to generate two datasets greatly reduces the time and financial costs compared to using these techniques separately. In Scotland, the European whitefish Coregonus lavaretus, is natively present in only two lakes and is suffering steep declines, and six refuge populations were established over the last 30 years as a conservation measure. This represents an ideal system to gain an insight into the processes of differentiation and adaptation at the first stages of population divergence. To do so, I used a combination of morphological, genomic and epigenomic analyses. I found a significant difference in body shape and linear traits between source and refuge populations, and convergence in body shape between refuge populations derived from different source populations. Analyses of genome-mapped SNPs showed significant FST divergence between source and refuge populations, increased inbreeding and relatedness, and reduced genetic diversity in the refuge populations. Using two separate approaches, I found genomic outliers associated with the translocations, located within or near genes involved in the immune and nervous system, and hepatic functions. DNA methylation analysis showed that refuge populations tended to be differentially methylated from the source in the same genomic regions, and identified many loci having distinct methylation signal between source and refuge populations. Finally, I found some evidence of epigenetic variation having a stronger correlation with phenotypic variation in more recently translocated populations, and genetic variation a stronger correlation with phenotypic variation in the older translocated populations, suggesting different adaptation mechanisms as time since establishment increases. These results suggest that translocations to new environments can affect evolutionary potential by impacting both genetic and epigenetic components of diversity. In conclusion, this research increases our understanding of the interplay between historical contingency and evolutionary forces in the process differentiation and adaptation at different stages of population divergence. In particular, the distinct evolutionary history of European whitefish populations in Britain and the rapid divergence observed between source and refuge populations in Scotland have profound implications for the conservation of this species.

This thesis explores different facets of the interface of traditional management systems around Mt Cameroon and national and global conservation policy and practice, including the way in which traditional management systems and 'non-timber forest products' have come to be studied and understood in the context of human-environment interactions and as a way of attempting to align economic development and conservation goals. Mt Cameroon has long been characterized by change and transformation - cultural, economic, ecological, political - all of which contribute to its extraordinary biological and cultural diversity. A global hotspot for biodiversity, in recent decades Mt Cameroon has attracted the attention of numerous conservation programs and donors. My research uses a range of intersecting questions, methods and approaches to capture the dynamics of social and environmental change at multiple scales, and over decades. It explores the way in which local-level knowledge and practices are shaped and mediated between households, communities, local and global markets and extra-local forces and agents, in particular those linked to livelihood and market-based conservation initiatives. I argue that a failure to identify the social and environmental dynamics of local groups' forest management practices, and an incongruously large emphasis on products sold in markets, can often legitimize the extractive activities that cause biodiversity and forest loss in the first place, while de-emphasizing locally-driven change and - ironically - glossing over diversity in cultures and ecosystems in pursuit of uniform, global prescriptions.

Protected areas are an essential component of efforts to halt biodiversity loss and they are widely used to protect species and habitats, and maintain essential ecosystem services that underpin human society and wellbeing. This is reflected by the Convention on Biological Diversity’s Aichi Target 11, which commits signatory nations by 2020 to protect at least 17% of the terrestrial realm through various state, private and community conservation designations, which are placed in areas important for biodiversity, representative, well-managed and integrated into the wider landscape. This target will be revisited at the 2020 Conference of the Parties, where it is expected that the target may be raised to perhaps as much as 30%. This is an ambitious commitment, and while there is a substantial body of research on protected areas, gaps remain in our understanding of how to rapidly build a global protected area network that covers a significant proportion of the Earth’s surface and is effective in maintaining its conservation value and supporting neighbouring people. In this thesis I aim to address some of these gaps. Chapter 2 addresses the problem of expanding a protected area network in the context of a densely populated and highly transformed country, in which remaining habitats exist only in small, scattered fragments. I examine the trade-offs involved, between the area of land necessary to meet representation targets and minimum protected area size thresholds, and the opportunity costs that may be incurred due to lost agricultural land. Chapter 3 examines the characteristics of a conservation area network comprising state-owned and managed protected areas, and other conservation areas owned and managed by private individuals and communities. I study the different contributions that conservation areas of differing governance types could make to the overall extent and representativeness of a network. Chapter 4 presents a conceptual framework in which I explore what drives the establishment of conservation areas across the globe. I highlight many frequently overlooked socio-economic and political factors that help explain why conservation area network extent differs so greatly between countries, and describe what conditions may be necessary to create an enabling environment for the growth of networks in the future. Chapter 5 presents a new methodology developed to improve the accuracy of estimates of global conservation area coverage. I produce a sample of the terrestrial realm that is representative of 10 key biogeographical and socio-economic factors that can be used as the focus for data collection efforts.

Many South-East Asian bird species are in rapid decline due to offtake for the cagebird trade, driven largely by consumption in Indonesia and labelled the ‘Asian Songbird Crisis’. The overall aim of this thesis is to identify the scale and scope of demand for songbirds as pets, and identify a portfolio of interventions to reduce the impact of demand on wild populations of songbirds. This will be achieved by quantifying, characterising, and exploring demand for songbirds among Java’s population, through assessing the spatial and temporal patterns of songbird ownership, and profiling the behaviour, preferences and motivations of songbirdkeeping consumers. Moreover, I will explore people’s perceptions and attitudes towards bird-keeping and wild birds, and develop a methodology to determine effective behaviour change message content. Using data from over 3,000 households across Java, it was determined that cagebird ownership levels were significantly higher in urban areas and the eastern provinces of the island, with a huge number of birds kept across a third of all households. Profiling three songbird-keeping user-groups (Hobbyists, Contestants and Breeders) uncovered that user-groups diverged in their bird-keeping habits and preferences, which influence the impact that they each have on wild bird populations. Exploring public attitudes around bird-keeping in Java revealed convergent and divergent opinions on the environmental importance and impact of keeping birds in households, and the importance of peer pressure and social norms in driving bird-keeping habits. Exploring what campaign messages may be the most persuasive uncovered that messages focussed on the negative impacts of overexploitation on Indonesia’s wildlife, or on the cultural heritage of bird-keeping, to be the most persuasive. This thesis provides a deep understanding of the demand for songbirds, and the actors involved, which can be used to inform behaviour change efforts and improve the conservation of wild bird populations in Indonesia and beyond.

Worldwide, human populations are growing, the climate is changing, and natural habitat is being converted to alternative land-uses. In particular, urbanisation has both positive and negative implications for society and biodiversity conservation. Within cities, there is increasing evidence that green (e.g. parks, gardens) and blue spaces (e.g. rivers, coast) can benefit human subjective wellbeing by restoring attentional fatigue and reducing stress, while also providing resources to support biodiversity. However, it remains unclear how biodiversity, and other specific features of urban green and blue spaces, enhance or detract from wellbeing. These details are crucial to informing land-use management and policy decisions in towns and cities. Much of the existing evidence originates from the global North, despite biodiversity loss, population growth, and urbanisation rates accelerating in the global South. Drawing on theories and methods from multiple disciplines, this thesis empirically explores relationships between green and blue spaces and human wellbeing in Georgetown, the capital city of Guyana. This biodiversity-rich country in northern South America has the highest rate of suicide worldwide and is poised to transform due to the discovery of vast quantities of off-shore oil. First, I expose a dose-response relationship between patterns of visitor use to urban green and blue spaces and experiential wellbeing, finding that age, safety concerns, and nature-relatedness dictate patterns of use. Second, I show that green and coastal blue spaces are important for bird diversity and human wellbeing respectively, although the two do not relate. Third, I assess how human perceptions of bird diversity, naturalness, sounds, and safety affect wellbeing, influenced by how restorative these spaces are perceived to be. Finally, I use participatory video to triangulate earlier findings, discovering that biodiversity provides a multisensory experience, with place attachment, personal insecurity, and cultural beliefs contributing to wellbeing in green and coastal blue space. This interdisciplinary thesis makes important empirical contributions to the field of biodiversity-wellbeing research, representing the first evidence gathered from neotropical South America. Overall, my results provide a valuable evidence-base to inform the development of interventions (e.g. targeted public health and educational campaigns) in biodiversity-rich cities like Georgetown. From a wider perspective, these findings could be harnessed by policy-makers striving to meet international targets on sustainability while maximising human quality of life at a national scale.

Protected areas play a significant role in conserving biodiversity and essential ecosystem services that help in providing sustainable development opportunities. As the world’s human population increases, however, these ecologically vital resources are threatened due to over-utilization of their resources. Nech Sar National Park of Ethiopia being one of them, is currently threatened due to the impact of human activities. Hence, this research bridges the knowledge gap on the impact of human activities on the natural capitals of the park. To examine this, ecological surveys were conducted by deploying transect lines along with experimental plots. Information was also collected from the indigenous communities of the park and stakeholders by making use of focus group discussions, interviews and questionnaires. Satellite images were used to assess the impact of human activity on the aquatic ecosystems of the park. Examination of the natural regeneration status showed that, the ground water vegetation of the park is not maintaining the natural regeneration of trees. According to the results of the Shannon Diversity Index, the woody vegetation species diversity of the park is being degraded due to deforestation. Findings showed that on average 824 matured trees are being cleared on daily basis to satisfy the household energy demands of Arba Minch town and the nearby inhabitants. The satellite image analysis indicated that, Lake Chamo lost 2,465.46 hectares of its surface area coverage in between the years of 1985 – 2015. The findings have showed more than 70% of the grassland areas of the park is highly endangered by the alien plant species (Prosopis, Abutilon, etc.). The wild animals are less adaptable to these invasive plants and are being affected in sustaining their life in the ecosystem. Due to human-wildlife conflict, the number of wild animals is also shrinking from time to time. Swayne’s Hartebeest for instance, may face local extinction since the remaining two individuals were believed to be male. The study also confirmed that, local communities of the protected area are neglected from participating in the management and governance of the park and this enhanced the lack of ownership feeling by the local communities. On top of this, the top-down governance approach of the park authorities who are based in the capital at about 510 km away from the park is also another bottle-neck that affect the sustainable development of the park since administrative power is not shared for the two regional states which border the park. Therefore, as the park is presently going through immense human interference, this study contributes to the management and governance of protected areas by formulating the integrated strategic approaches which includes community participation in the governance and management of the park, provision of alternative energy and livelihood opportunities which can help the sustainable development of the park’s ecosystem services. The study also recommends further research in the areas of invasive plants and detailed analysis on the impact of human activities on the aquatic ecosystems of the protected area.

Healthy mangroves are important for the provisioning of ecosystem goods and services that contribute to human wellbeing. Productive fisheries have been associated with healthy mangrove forests which function as nursery habitats for juvenile reef species. The threats facing mangroves and other nearshore habitats like seagrass beds are still high. Despite these threats, the rate of loss for instance for mangroves is on the decline due to increased global awareness. Replanting and reforestation of degraded areas has also been on the increase. Greater attention is now paid on the quality of the remaining forests and of restored areas and how this affects the capacity to provide ecosystem goods and services. The current study sought to explore the role of forest quality in fish and crustacean community structure (biomass, abundance, species diversity) in the Vanga mangrove ecosystem, in south coast Kenya. Further, it aimed to explore the role of the seascape (a mosaic of connected habitats), with a focus on seagrass beds, on the faunal community assemblages sampled in mangrove areas. Chapter one discusses mangrove goods and services and especially the role they play in supporting healthy fisheries. It explores the definition of 'nursery habitats' and the key elements that define them. It also discusses roles of mangroves as refugia and feeding grounds for juvenile fish and the links between mangroves and offshore fisheries. Chapter two describes fish and crustacean community assemblages in Vanga. Fyke nets were used to sample fish at 14 mangrove sites between September 2015 and September 2017. Fishes were sampled once every three months. A total of 59 fish and 16 crustacean species were encountered with 50% of these species (both fishes and crustaceans) being of commercial importance. Circa 70% of the catch was dominated by six species, as is common with nearshore habitats. Over 95% of the fishes caught were juveniles, further strengthening the argument for mangroves as nursery habitats. Chapter three addresses the importance of mangrove forest quality on faunal communities. The Complexity Index (C.I.), a product of forest structural features (stem density, mean tree height, basal area and no. of species) was used as a proxy for habitat quality of mangroves. Broad scale and fine scale forest features were regressed against fish and crustacean variables: biomass, abundance and number of species. Fine scale forest features were not important in structuring fish and crustacean communities whilst broad scale features did show significant relationships. Mean fish abundance decreased with increasing C.I. while mean crustacean abundance increased with increasing C.I. There were sites that showed high diversity and corresponding high fish biomass for fishes and high abundance and biomass for crustaceans over time. Chapter four discusses the diet of six of the most abundant fishes that were sampled. A total of 193 stomachs were analysed using the stomach content analysis method. Nine food categories consisting of 36 different prey items were ingested and crustaceans were the most dominant food category. All six sampled species ingested insects, which they most likely got from the mangrove forests. This indicates that some feeding took place in the mangroves. The diet breadth was narrow and ranged between 0.08 – 0.45 revealing that most fish species fed on a low variety of prey items. Chapter five explores the influence of seagrass metrics on fish and crustacean assemblages sampled in the mangrove forest sites. The spatial analysis and calculation of seagrass geometry was done using ArcGIS. Seagrass metrics - area, perimeter, perimeter/area ratio, cumulative area and cumulative perimeter - were regressed against fish and crustacean variables. Fish variables were positively correlated with seagrass area and responded negatively to increasing perimeter/area ratio. On the other hand, crustaceans increased with increasing perimeter/area ratio; hence there was a tendency for fishes and crustaceans to respond in opposite ways to seagrass seascape metrics. In this respect, these results mirrored those found when exploring the effects of forest quality metrics. Most fishes and crustaceans responded to seagrass metrics measured within a distance of 3.5km from the catch sites. From this study, seascape features of the seagrass beds are found to be important for some of the fish and crustacean species caught in the mangroves meaning that it is not sufficient to explain faunal assemblages with a focus on a single seascape habitat. Chapter 6 is a synthesis of all the chapters in this thesis bringing together all the findings and generating general conclusions and their implications on management approaches. Multiple linear regression models that include both forest and seascape variables were tested against fish and crustacean variables. The strongest significant relationship (p=0.001) was between the Indian white prawn Penaeus indicus and perimeter/area ratio at 2.5km, and mean tree height, number of tree species and stem density of mangroves. About 87% of the variation was explained by these predictor variables. This study suggests that, given the increasing interest in a holistic approach to seascape management and conservation, seascape habitats can no longer be studied in isolation. In addition, the current work has shown that different faunal groups and even individual species respond differently to forest and seascape features and therefore, the notion of a single 'nursery habitat ecosystem function' is simplistic; rather the mangrove/seagrass seascape provides a range of different nursery services for the species present.

Drawing on emergent post-anthropocentric theories in politics, security and international relations, this thesis offers a study of the South African poaching crisis from a posthuman perspective. At the core of the study is the development of the wildlife security assemblage, which closely analyses the relationship between security and wildlife conservation in the region and questions the dominant anthropocentrism that not only impacts upon ethical conservation practices, but also speaks to a wider need to address problematic interspecies relations that impinge upon our abilities to coexist with nonhuman nature. This thesis uses predominantly ethnographic research methods, and reflects the movement towards multispecies ethnography when engaging with the politics of the interspecies encounter. It includes extensive field work in the region of South Africa whereby I engaged with many people and places that constituted what I came to understand as the wildlife security assemblage in order to make sense of the complexity of this interspecies security issue. This ranged from trophy hunting to game rangers and activists, showing distinctive interpretations as to what constitutes conservation practice. From this field work, three substantive chapters emerged that reflected the findings: Violence, surveillance and care. The thesis offers a comprehensive literature review identifying a gap for more interspecies approaches to political knowledge, particularly in terms of a sensibility for wildlife within the nexus of security. Furthermore, it offers a novel conceptual framework through which to address complex interspecies security issues that borrows from various strands of posthuman, post-anthropocentric approaches and explains the logics of power that shape and mould the assemblage and the relations within it through the three substantive chapters.

Conservation reintroductions are a frequently used management tool for the recovery of endangered species. However, many reintroductions fail to establish viable, self-sustaining populations. There are a multitude of factors that can impact the success of a reintroduction programme and population genetic aspects have been identified as an essential factor in the long-term persistence of reintroduced populations. However, due to a general lack of detailed long-term data sets, little is known about how different reintroduction strategies affect the genetic viability of a population and the long-term reintroduction success. In this thesis I apply high-resolution genomic tools to investigate the reintroduction of the Asiatic wild ass Equus hemionus in Israel. This case study provides a unique opportunity to investigate genetic impacts of conservation reintroductions, as it offers a long-term data set and a rare reintroduction protocol: founder individuals of the population were sourced from two different subspecies. I recovered a genome-wide set of genetic markers for the species using high-throughput sequencing techniques. Analyses based on this data set show that the populations display high levels of subspecies admixture and that population genetic parameters indicate a relatively high genetic variability compared with other reintroduced E. hemionus populations. These findings suggest that the highly controversial practice of subspecies admixture may be beneficial to reintroduction success in certain scenarios. Furthermore, I apply tools and methods from landscape ecology to uncover that habitat characteristics impact individual habitat selection but not genetic relatedness across the landscape. These findings suggest that current landscape configurations pose no barrier to gene flow in the reintroduced population. The presented results provide new insights on the population in Israel, relevant for its continued management. Furthermore, the outcome of this study has broader implications for conservation reintroductions in general.

As the largest terrestrial animal on earth, elephants perform important and irreplaceable roles within their environments. However, Asian elephants are facing extinction by the end of the century, with human-elephant conflict and poaching as the main drivers behind their rapid population decline. In Asia, conservation actions rarely take into account the movement ecology of elephants due to the lack of information available. Therefore, conservation actions could be improved by having a deeper understanding of Asian elephant movement ecology. In light of this knowledge gap, this thesis has increased our understanding of Asian elephant movement ecology by generating over 250,000 GPS locations from 51 individuals between 2011-2018, which is equivalent to over 500,000 hours of elephant monitoring in Peninsular Malaysia. In addition, our baseline analysis of elephant movements in Peninsular Malaysia generated information about home range size (up to 600 km2), movement patterns, habitat selection (avoid steep slopes and preferred secondary forest and open habitats), and how human pressures are affecting elephant movements (decreases home range size). Additionally, a mechanistic modelling framework discovered roads caused strong and consistent barrier effects for elephants, increased mortality, and significantly reduced the permeability (on average by 79.5%) between forest patches. Lastly, post-monitoring of translocated elephants revealed critical patterns in response to translocation. Translocated elephants varied in their responses, with a high proportion of elephants (56%) returning to the original human-conflict area (up to 80 km) or left the protected area, which resulted in translocated movements not settling in the first year. This thesis will contribute to a better understanding of the movement ecology of elephants and provide relevant research for the conservation of the species and their habitats.

Studying species richness distribution patterns depends on data quality, which imposes challenges for conservation action. Species distribution modelling is a powerful tool to overcome some of these hurdles, and can gives us ecological and biogeographical insights about species distributions patterns and habitat suitability even in poorly sampled habitats. The main objective for this thesis was to model the distribution of 62 terrestrial reptile (lizard and snake) species to obtain the pattern of species richness and habitat suitability across Saudi Arabia. I used both species distribution models (SDMs) built for Egypt (a better-studied area) and then spatially transferred into Saudi conditions, as well as models built with local data. Maxent software was used to interpolate (based on Saudi data) and transfer (based on Egyptian data) models. The accuracies of these models were then evaluated on-the-ground using data from field work conducted in the summer of 2017 and 2018 in Tabuk Province. The detectability and occupancy of each species in the field was estimated using PRESENCE software. I then assessed the conservation value of the proposed and current Protected Area network in Saudi (managed by the Saudi Wildlife Authority) and identified potential new important areas of conservation planning under various different assumptions (socioeconomic and uncertainty analysis) using Zonation software. The maximum species richness of reptiles was predicted to occur in the central plateau, north-western borders, south-western areas, and in the coastal areas of Saudi Arabia. I identified areas across Saudi Arabia that are considered to be under-sampled relative to these predictions. The transferred Egyptian models yielded very effective predictions, analogous to those generated by local independent models based on Saudi data. Some species were predicted better by the transferred Egyptian model than the equivalent Saudi model. Model accuracy across species as estimated using the independent field data varied among species and correlated positively with accuracy estimated using partitioning of the original Saudi data, but validation using independent data gave lower accuracy estimates overall than data partitioning. Ground-truthing validation showed that the transferred Egyptian model was able to predict presences better than the Saudi model built from local data, and that the Saudi model was better at capturing the predicted areas of high species richness. Species detectability in the field was weakly positively correlated with model accuracy calculated from the new independent field data, hinting that models work better for species which are easy to survey. The directed field validation successfully led us to record species within Saudi Arabia that had not been recorded before, and extend the known range for a species that is located completely outside the Protected Areas and had not been recorded for 40 years. I found that the conservation value of current and proposed Saudi’s PAs was significantly better than the areas outside them across all Zonation models. I proposed possible extensions of some PAs to cover top-ranking areas predicted to be suitable for reptile conservation. SDM predictions appear to be a very effective tool for exploring spatial patterns of species diversity, especially when there is a paucity of data. When testing SDMs, using new data, collected independently of the data used to build the models, seems to be the best practice to evaluate model predictive performance, but caveats with such data must be considered as they may not be entirely statistically independent. Incorporating different scenarios in conservation assessments and planning can help increase its reliability in identifying potential important areas for conservation.

This thesis aims to enhance the conservation of CWR diversity in the Fertile Crescent. CWR are species of plants that are genetically close to cultivated crops. They are important sources of plant genetic materials that can be used for crop improvements. The Fertile Crescent is an important centre as it is a centre of crop domestication. Finding CWR in the Fertile Crescent region was carried out through creating a checklist of CWR, prioritisation, collecting passport data, ex-situ and in-situ gap analysis, climate change analysis, and threat analysis. A priority list of 220 CWR taxa was established following 12 prioritisation criteria. The priority list was revised and a new priority list consisted of 441 CWR were established. 23,878 occurrence records were collated. Ten genetic reserves are recommended. 70% of the CWR examined taxa are represented in gene banks. The most important areas for further collecting for ex-situ conservation are located in the west and south of Turkey. CAPFITOGEN result indicates that the top three sites with the highest CWR taxa concentration are found in eastern Turkey. The fourth highest site is found in Latakia in Syria. The result of the climate change analysis revealed that Aegilops bicornis, a wild relative of bread wheat, and Triticum monococcum, a wild relative of wheat, are expected to be highly impacted by climate change. The IUCN red assessment result indicates that out of the 88 taxa assessed, one taxon was assessed as Critically Endangered, 18 taxa as Data Deficient, three taxa as Endangered, 41 as Least Concern and 25 as Near Threatened. All these components will help the Fertile Crescent meet its targets in conserving CWR diversity as well as ensuring CWRs are preserved to prevent and tackle global food insecurity. Future work is to fill the gaps in conservation outlined in this research.

Global climate change, and in particular, global warming is currently one of the greatest threats to freshwater biodiversity. The microbial diversity within freshwaters is phylogenetically and functionally diverse. Yet, the impacts of warming on these complex communities are largely unknown. To date, the vast majority of research ignores the complexity of natural systems, instead, exploring freshwater microbial responses to warming under simplified, undisturbed conditions. I, therefore, assess the impacts of warming on freshwater microbial communities using a range of methodological approaches (field surveys, field experiments and laboratory experiments), while considering other factors which could simultaneously affect freshwater microbial communities, and thus, their responses to warming. To begin, I show that microbial communities from different freshwater microhabitats respond differently to warming. Therefore, to gain a better understanding of the impacts of warming on a given system, microbial communities from multiple microhabitats should be profiled. Next, I studied the impacts of warming on assembling freshwater biofilms across a catchment gradient. I discover that microbial community responses to warming were different in streams located within impacted catchments, compared with microbial communities from unimpacted catchments. Finally, I demonstrate that temperature is a weak environmental filter in the absence of a predator, thus, highlighting the importance of the indirect effects of warming in shaping bacterial communities. I conclude that both the biotic and abiotic variables present in freshwater systems can alter the effects of warming on microbial communities. Therefore, predictions might under- or over-estimate the impacts of warming on freshwater microbial communities if other biotic or abiotic variables present in the system are overlooked.

This thesis examines the process of regulating caviar trade in the European Union. EU caviar trade regulations seek to curb overexploitation of critically endangered wild sturgeon and prevent illegal caviar trade. The broad impacts of these regulations are largely overlooked and not understood. This research produces necessary empirical insights by undertaking an in-depth qualitative analysis of the EU caviar trade regulations, and asks: what are the geopolitical-ecological implications of regulating the caviar trade in the European Union? Geopolitical-ecology refers to how environmental discourses and interventions are mediated through foreign policy agendas, and subsequently shape ecologies with multi-scalar geopolitical effects. This study draws upon environmental geopolitics, geopolitical ecology, and more-than-human scholarship to develop a framework for more-than-human geopolitical ecology. I deploy this theoretical framework alongside a follow-the-policy methodology, which traces: how caviar trade policies variably materialise in the EU; with what effects; and how these effects are unequally distributed amongst human and nonhuman actors. In analysing the implications of the EU caviar trade policies, I develop a twofold argument. First, I argue that the regulatory frameworks exhibit a number of gaps and grey areas. These include gaps in content; gaps in enforcement; and gaps in the policy narratives that sustain the regulatory frameworks. Such legislative omissions and ambiguities produce unintended geopolitical-ecological consequences that extend beyond the illegal caviar trade. Indeed, there are broader implications for EU security, geopolitics, and political ecologies. Second, I argue that caviar and sturgeon are unlikely geopolitical actors. The geopolitical nature of these nonhuman actors is brought to light through the ways in which they reveal inconsistencies in the regulatory frameworks, and thereby co-produce resulting EU geopolitical-ecological configurations. While developing burgeoning conversations about illegal wildlife trade and the EU, these insights also demonstrate the important role of nonhumans in co-producing geopolitical-ecologies within the region and more broadly.

Global land use is changing at an unprecedented rate and has been identified as a key driver of habitat loss, fragmentation and species decline in the natural environment. Understanding how land use influences spatial patterns in species abundance, and habitat connectivity at a landscape scale is critical for the survival of wildlife populations. The focal species of my research is the rare greater horseshoe bat (Rhinolophus ferrumequinum), which was once widespread across southern England and Wales. However, owing to changes in agricultural land management and the expansion of urban areas, its range has contracted considerably over the last century. Using a series of ecological techniques, including a novel predictive modelling approach, field experiments and social network analysis, this thesis aims to identify which ecological factors affect their activity and movement at a landscape scale. The work also provides conservation practitioners the ability to identify the locations of these impacts, pinch-points, in the wider environment; where strategic planning and mitigation measures can be applied to increase their overall occurrence and abundance in the wider environment. Using a field experiment, I examined how traffic noise can influence the relative activity levels of free-living bats. Overall, I showed that traffic noise can significantly reduce the activity levels of R. ferrumequinum, as well as other bat species, along linear feature. Using a separate field experiment, I determined that the sonic spectrum had a greater negative effect on bat activity than the ultrasonic spectrum. These results therefore suggest that the mode of action is likely to be through general deterrence and avoidance rather than through the masking of echolocation calls. R. ferrumequinum are widely considered to be dependent on linear landscape features such as woodland edges and hedgerows. My research supported this view, and highlighted the particular importance of treelines, which were associated with greater activity than even sympathetically managed hedgerows. However, an important novel finding from my research was that about a third of all activity recorded at paired detectors was derived from the middle of fields. It is therefore important to consider these more open habitats, as well as hedgerows, treelines and woodland edges, when designing and conducting ecological impact assessments for future developments. Bats use the landscape at a large spatial scale, and responses to any particular challenge (such as a new lighting scheme or urban development) are likely to depend on their context within a landscape. For example, the disruption of a commuting route is likely to have a greater impact where only one suitable route exists, compared with scenarios where there are numerous alternatives. To understand better how R. ferrumequinum interacts with the British landscape, I therefore created models of predicted functional connectivity around four maternity roosts using Circuitscape software. Using non-invasive static bat detectors as a method of ground validation, I created robust models predicting R. ferrumequinum movement; which allowed the identification of pinch-points in the landscape, either those areas limiting species movement or highly important for the species conservation. While most research, and the work of ecological practitioners, focuses on the maternity season, hibernation ecology has received much less attention. Yet given that horseshoe bats are known to move roost location frequently during the hibernation period, it is important to understand more about this behaviour. Using social network analysis, I demonstrate that adult males are significantly more central (connected to a higher number of individual bats) in the network during the hibernation period. I found that movements between hibernacula were associated with both age and degree centrality of individual bats, with those more geographically isolated hibernacula playing an important role for the movement of certain individuals at a landscape scale. This highlights that despite low activity in some of these smaller roost locations, they are a conservation priority to decrease the risk of fragmentation and loss of connectivity within the wider landscape. The results of my meta-analysis, which was based on 22 studies, demonstrated the significant negative effects endectocides on Aphodiinae dung beetles. My results suggest that ivermectin has the highest negative effect on the abundance of both adult and large Aphodiinae dung beetles. However, contrasting results were observed for dung beetle occurrence, with adult beetles showing an attraction to dung with endectocides and larvae showing the complete opposite, with poor survival rates and impaired development. Over time this could have significant negative effects on dung beetle populations. The results of this thesis indicate that the landscape-scale conservation of R. ferrumequinum is complex. Considerations need to be given to a suite of factors ranging from the prey items they consume to the physical habitat structures which they utilise. From this research, specific locations and features which have impacts on their movement and activity can be identified, allowing the outputs to be used by decision-makers as a tool to inform local management strategies. The prioritisation of conservation activity for the species can be aided by spatially-explicit models, such as the one I developed using Circuitscape, which bring together multiple input layers to create outputs readily interpretable to practitioners. However, to achieve a successful outcome for this priority species, collaborative efforts from many stakeholders, across boundaries, are required.

A considerable body of scientific evidence shows that the world is currently suffering a biodiversity crisis driven by anthropogenic factors such as land-use change, environmental pollution and climate change. Our knowledge of this crisis is incomplete, however, particularly when it comes to the most diverse multi-cellular organisms on the planet, the insects. Although there is evidence of decline in the abundance, distribution and biomass of many insect species, recent attempts to extrapolate these to global scales and encourage a policy response have been met with scepticism. More data are required, together with reliable methods to integrate and interpret them. In parallel, evidence-based conservation initiatives are urgently needed to address the biodiversity crisis. Citizen science has great promise for gathering much-needed data on insect trends and for engaging the public in biodiversity conservation. Citizen science has undergone a rapid rise in popularity over the past two decades, increasing the capacity for cost-effective, spatially-extensive biodiversity monitoring, while also raising awareness and commitment to nature conservation among participating members of the public. However, citizen science approaches can also present challenges, such as reductions in data quality, constraints in sampling strategies and in the onward reuse of data. In this thesis, citizen science monitoring of Great Britain’s (GB) moths and butterflies is examined as a case study, assessing some of the benefits and limitations of increased participation and demonstrating applications of citizen science data in determining species trends, drivers of change and estimates of extinction risk. Overall moth abundance has decreased in GB, probably mainly as a result of habitat degradation, while climate change has enabled the range expansion of some species (Chapter 2). Much remains to be learnt about other potential drivers of change, such as chemical pollution and artificial light at night (Chapter 2). I demonstrated the efficacy of citizen science by calculating GB distribution trends for 673 moth species for the first time, finding that 260 species had undergone statistically significant long-term declines compared with 160 that had increased significantly (Chapter 3). The geographical patterns of change were consistent with expected responses to land-use, nutrient enrichment and climatic change (Chapter 3). I also utilised citizen-science derived monitoring data for 485 Lepidoptera species to investigate the impact of insect population variability on the assessment of Red List extinction risk using 10-year trends as specified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature procedure (Chapter 5). I concluded that for these taxa, strict use of 10-year trends produces Red List classifications that are unacceptably biased by the start year (Chapter 5). In Chapter 4, I showed that mass-participation citizen science data obtained using a simple sampling protocol produced comparable estimates of butterfly species abundance to data collected through standardized monitoring undertaken by experienced volunteers. Resulting increases in participation, along with the associated benefits of public engagement and awareness raising, need not have a detrimental impact on the ability to detect abundance trends in common butterfly species. However, citizen science participation may affect the onward use of data, unless this is considered at the outset. I found that despite support in principle for open access to distribution records of butterflies and moths, most citizen scientists were much more cautious in practice, preferring to limit the spatial resolution of records, particularly of threatened species, and restrict commercial reuse of data (Chapter 6). Overall, these results demonstrate the potential for citizen science, involving both expert volunteer naturalists and inexperienced members of the public, to address the global biodiversity knowledge gap through generating meaningful trend estimates for insect species and elucidating the drivers of change.

By the mid-twentieth century, the majority of great whale species were threatened with extinction, following centuries of commercial whaling. Since the implementation of a moratorium on commercial whaling in 1985 by the International Whaling Commission, the recovery of whale population is being regularly assessed. Various methods are used to survey whale populations, though most are spatially limited and prevent remote areas from being studied. Satellites orbiting Earth can access most regions of the planet, offering a potential solution to surveying remote locations. With recent improvements in the spatial resolution of satellite imagery, it is now possible to detect wildlife from space, including whales. In this thesis, I aimed to further investigate the feasibility of very high resolution (VHR) satellite imagery as a tool to reliably monitor whales. The first objective was to describe, both visually and spectrally, how four morphologically distinct species appear in VHR satellite imagery. The second objective was to explore different ways to automatically detect whales in such imagery, as the current alternative is manual detection, which is time-consuming and impractical when monitoring large areas. With the third objective, I attempted to give some insights on how to estimate the maximum depth at which a whale can be detected in VHR satellite imagery, as this will be crucial to estimate whale abundance from space. This thesis shows that the four species targeted could be detected with varying degrees of accuracy, some contrasting better with their surroundings. Compared to manual detection, the automated systems trialled here took longer, were not as accurate, and were not transferable to other images, suggesting to focus future automation research on machine learning and the creation of a well-labelled database required to train and validate. The maximum depth of detection could be assessed only approximately using nautical charts. Other methods such as the installation of panels at various depths should be trialled, although it requires prior knowledge of the spectral reflectance of whales above the surface, which I tested on post-mortem samples of whale integument and proved unreliable. Such reflectance should be measured on free-swimming whale using unmanned aerial vehicles or small aircraft. Overall, this thesis shows that currently VHR satellite imagery can be a useful tool to assess the presence or absence of whales, encouraging further developments to make VHR satellite imagery a reliable method to monitor whale numbers.

Palm oil is the most produced vegetable oil in the world. The rapid expansion of oil palm plantations into millions of hectares of forest has resulted in severe losses of biodiversity and increased pollution. Management interventions to mitigate these impacts are clearly needed. Oil palm is capable of supporting a dense understory with vegetation that can reach several metres high. However, some plantation owners completely remove this by spraying herbicide liberally. This destructive practice is likely to have a negative impact on biodiversity and associated ecosystem services, as it reduces habitat complexity and the capacity of plantations to buffer microclimate. This study is based at the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Function in Tropical Agriculture (BEFTA) Programme in Sumatra, Indonesia. Study sites are based across four habitat types, including three different levels of understory management in mature oil palm plantations and a recently-replanted oil palm site. We investigated the effect of these management treatments on several key groups, including large mammals, rats, ants, and termites, and associated ecosystem functions. Large Mammals & Rats: Using camera traps to assess mammal populations we showed that Leopard cats, which are an important predator of pest rats, prefer plantations with more vegetation. However, by using live traps to quantify rat abundance and manual counts to measure rat damage to palm oil fruit bunches, we showed that this did not translate to a reduction in pest abundance or damage. Termites: By surveying and manually searching termite mounds, we showed that altering understory vegetation management in mature plantations does not affect the abundance of termite mounds or the likelihood that they are inhabited by termites. We also found a great diversity of organisms nesting in the mounds, including four species of snake, making this the first scientific documentation of this symbiosis. Ants: By conducting 18 month-long manipulative suppression experiments, we showed that there is little redundancy for the role of ants in maintaining ecosystem functioning in oil palm plantations. Where ant abundance was suppressed, herbivore predation and seed removal were significantly reduced. There was no difference between the habitat types, indicating that ants are important under all management scenarios. This thesis clearly shows the value of biodiversity within the oil palm matrix, by directly linking it to important ecosystem services. It shows that the impact of understory vegetation management and replanting on biodiversity is variable, with some taxa being robust to highly destructive practices. It demonstrates the importance of investigating the impact of conservation interventions on a range of taxa, as complex interactions are at play even in these simplified landscapes.

Conservation conflicts occur when people clash over conservation objectives. They are damaging for biodiversity, livelihoods, and human well-being globally, and are often managed via interventions intended to change people's behaviour. However, variation in intervention approaches across contexts remains underexplored. This thesis seeks to inform management by better understanding the roots of conflict, and the factors constraining the choice and efficacy of different interventions. Using an empirical literature review, I first identify five intervention types - 'technical', 'cognitive', 'economic', 'enforcement' and 'stakeholder' - and how they associate with conflict frames, behaviours and geography. I then largely corroborate these results in an experimental survey with conservation professionals, which also uncovers how decision-makers' characteristics, including disciplinary and demographic backgrounds, predict their intervention priorities. I then draw upon stakeholder interviews in Enduimet Wildlife Management Area in Tanzania, and grey literature to identify how multiple levels of conflict - covering human-elephant interactions, stakeholder interactions, and governance structures - constrain local management options. Next, using an experimental public goods game in Enduimet, I find that stakeholder perceptions of intervener trustworthiness predict levels of cooperation with conflict interventions. Lastly, by analysing conflict over trophy hunting via the social media platform Twitter, I reveal how this issue is polarised along similar political and value-based dimensions as other environmental conflicts. Beyond advocating for behaviourallyinformed interventions, these findings have three key management implications: that the backgrounds of decision-makers mediate their priorities, that the backgrounds of interveners mediate responses to interventions, and that the socio-political and governance background of conflicts will likely mediate the outcome of interventions.

Land-use change is a major driver of biodiversity change; while it increases many species’ extinction risk and often causes a loss of local diversity, it also promotes the establishment of novel alien and native species. All these processes change the species composition of assemblages. Global syntheses rarely compare the effects of land-use change across different ecological systems, limiting our ability to identify which systems are most affected. Islands and mainlands often face different human pressures and harbour very different species assemblages. Importantly, many islands harbour native species that are particularly sensitive to human pressures and they tend to be more vulnerable than mainlands to invasions by alien species. In this thesis, I model a global collation of site-level biodiversity data from sites facing different land uses and related pressures to answer three questions. Does the change in species composition caused by land-use change differ between islands and mainlands? Have land-use change and related pressures decreased biodiversity integrity more on islands than on mainlands? How do land use and related pressures affect the diversity of alien and native species on islands? My results highlight particular cases where land-use change causes a greater change in local species assemblages on islands than on mainlands. Based on the Biodiversity Intactness Index (BII), I also show that, on average, land-use change and related pressures have reduced biotic integrity more on islands than on mainlands, mainly because island species are more sensitive to human pressures. The chapters underpinning these findings represent the first global analyses to include a wide range of taxa while comparing biodiversity responses on islands and mainlands to land-use change. Additionally, through analyses focusing exclusively on islands, I show that land-use change reduces both local richness and total abundance of island native species but increases both the number and abundance of alien species. My results highlight the sensitivity of island natives to human pressures and attest to the establishment of alien species on islands, particularly in disturbed habitats and on more isolated islands. They support calls for stronger efforts to protect islands’ unique biodiversity. This thesis also contributes to the development of a new implementation of BII, improving on the statistical modelling approach used recently to estimate BII globally. In a final analysis integrating results from the different chapters, I show that this improved approach yields estimates that reflect the intactness of native biodiversity more accurately than previous estimates. Most of this improvement is attributable to the use of a more stringent definition for sites whose biota is assumed to have been minimally impacted by people, which was facilitated by a more efficient use of the underlying assemblage data.

Biodiversity loss remains a global challenge, and monitoring methods are often limited in their coverage. Rivers State is a biodiversity hotspot because of the high number of endemic species endangered by oil pollution. This thesis investigates the potential of integrating remote sensing tools for monitoring biodiversity in the State using vascular plant species as indicators. Satellite data from Hyperion, Sentinel 2A and Landsat were analysed for their usefulness. Soil samples from polluted and control transects were analysed for total petroleum hydrocarbon (TPH), phosphorus (P), lead (Pb), temperature, acidity, species diversity, abundance and leaf chlorophyll concentration. Field data results showed significant differences in all variables between polluted and control transects. Average TPH on polluted transects was 12,296 mg/kg, and on control transects was 40.53 mg/kg. 163 plant species of 52 families were recorded with Poaceae and Cyperaceae the most abundant. Floristic data ordinated on orthogonal axes of soil parameters revealed that TPH strongly influenced species occurrence (r = -0.42) and abundance (r = -0.39). Similarly, application of the spectral variability hypothesis (SVH) revealed the underlying environmental gradient controlling vegetation composition on polluted transects as TPH and on control transects as P. Models of relationship between spectral metrics and soil properties estimated soil TPH (R2 = 0.45) and P (R2 = 0.62) with marginal errors. Hyperion data provided better insight into vegetation response to oil pollution. Continuum removed reflectance, band depths of absorption maxima, red edge reflectance all significantly differed between polluted and control vegetation. Furthermore, a new index created from TPH sensitive Hyperion wavelengths- normalised difference vegetation vigour index (NDVVI) outperformed traditional narrowband vegetation indices (NBVIs) in models estimating species diversity in Kporghor. R2 and RMSE values for Shannon's index were 0.54 and 0.5 for NDVVI-based models and 0.2 and 0.67 for NBVI-based models respectively. This research provides evidence of oil pollution effect on vegetation composition, abundance, growth and reflectance and outlines how this information can be used for biodiversity monitoring.