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The source of almost all of the lead (Pb) found in meat from carcasses of wild-shot small game animals is often thought to be small embedded fragments of the lead shotgun pellets usually used by hunters to kill them. Available circumstantial evidence supports this conjecture, but an unknown proportion of the lead in game meat might be biologically-incorporated and absorbed by the game animal from ingested shotgun pellets and other environmental sources, such as soil and residues from mining. A critical test comparing lead concentrations in meat from animals known to have been killed using different types of shotgun ammunition has not been performed until now. We compared lead concentrations in samples of edible meat from carcasses of 27 wild-shot common pheasants (Phasianus colchicus) from which only lead shotgun pellets were recovered post mortem with concentrations for 20 birds from which only iron pellets were recovered. Shotgun pellets were removed from the meat samples before analysis. The mean concentration of lead was about 30 times greater in the meat of pheasants shot with lead than those shot with iron and was similar to mean concentrations of lead reported previously from Europe-wide samples of meat from wild-shot small game animals, including pheasants, killed using unknown types of ammunition. These results support the hypothesis that changing the type of shotgun ammunition in use for hunting from lead to iron would greatly reduce the concentration of lead in meat from wild-shot small game.

Headstarting is a conservation approach that suggests offering an advantage to a population by improving egg production, survival of embryos and/or juveniles. In this article, we are providing the quantitative data obtained during 10-years for different stages of headstarting (production of eggs per pair, hatching and fledging rates) and the resulting impact (survival to maturity, philopatry rate, sex ratio, apparent survival, growth/decline rate) on the local population of the critically endangered spoon-billed sandpiper. We have shown that headstarting gain is reduced over time from fledging to long-term recruitment to the local breeding population. The possible reasons for this reduction are suggested and discussed. The unexpected finding was a drastic difference in sex ratios of the new recruits which was about even for headstaring, but strongly male-biased for wild reared birds. We suggest that to happen due to increased mortality of female chicks in nature. We have also shown only headstarting could stop the global decline of the species, particularly once the suggested improvements are implemented and the number of pairs involved is scaled up. Headstarting also had a significant social effect due to involvement of in-creasing numbers of people both in the local communities in Chukotka and from many countries on the flyway into searching for marked birds and learning about waders, raising awareness about ecological problems on the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, thus, making the need for conservation actions on the flyway more obvious and sensible.

During the Quaternary, large climate oscillations impacted the distribution and demography of species globally. Two approaches have played a major role in reconstructing changes through time: Bayesian Skyline Plots (BSPs), which reconstruct population fluctuations based on genetic data, and Species Distribution Models (SDMs), which allow us to back‐cast the range occupied by a species based on its climatic preferences. In this paper, we contrast these two approaches by applying them to a large data set of 102 Holarctic bird species, for which both mitochondrial DNA sequences and distribution maps are available, to reconstruct their dynamics since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Most species experienced an increase in effective population size (Ne, as estimated by BSPs) as well as an increase in geographical range (as reconstructed by SDMs) since the LGM; however, we found no correlation between the magnitude of changes in Ne and range size. The only clear signal we could detect was a later and greater increase in Ne for wetland birds compared to species that live in other habitats, a probable consequence of a delayed and more extensive increase in the extent of this habitat type after the LGM. The lack of correlation between SDM and BSP reconstructions could not be reconciled even when range shifts were considered. We suggest that this pattern might be linked to changes in population densities, which can be independent of range changes, and caution that interpreting either SDMs or BSPs independently is problematic and potentially misleading.

Effective conservation is often informed by focal species studies to identify beneficial land management interventions. For nocturnal or cryptic species, quantifying habitat use across individually-marked animals can allow unbiased assessment of intervention efficacy and identify other important habitats. Here, using a landscape-scale experiment, we examine whether interventions intended to create nesting habitat for the largely nocturnal Eurasian Stone-curlew Burhinus oedicnemus within semi-natural grassland also provide foraging habitat. GPS loggers were fitted to five adult Stone-curlews during the breeding season within an extensive area of semi-natural grassland (3,850 ha, hereafter ‘grassland’), surrounded by a mosaic of arable cropland (total study area 118,600 ha). The largely closed-sward grassland was diversified by experimental ground-disturbance plots (the intervention) prior to this study. We used the GPS fixes to identify 1,881 foraging locations (510 during nesting and 1,371 post-breeding) across the grassland and surrounding landscape. Most foraging locations were close to the nest-site during the nesting period (90% within 1 km) or day-roost during post-breeding (90% within 5 km), but birds travelled up to 4.1 km from these sites during nesting and 13 km post-breeding. Stone-curlews were two- (by night) or three-times (by day) more likely to select disturbed-grassland over unmodified grassland for foraging during nesting, and approximately fifteen times more likely to do so post-breeding. Spring-sown crops and pig fields or manure heaps were also selected over grassland for nocturnal foraging. Given that central place foraging occurs in this species, conservation efforts that promote breeding attempts through ground-disturbance should ensure suitable foraging habitat is near the nest (< 1 km). Creating multiple areas of disturbed-ground close to the edge of large grassland blocks can provide a network of nesting and foraging habitats, whilst allowing access to foraging habitats on the surrounding arable farmland. Similar interventions may benefit other disturbance associated grassland waders.

No abstract.

Population declines of the critically endangered Sociable Lapwing are probably due to high mortality along its migration routes or on its wintering grounds, both of which are very poorly known. We therefore undertook a long-term study of the species’ movements using satellite tagging, colour-ringing, targeted field surveys and a database of historical and recent sightings. We identified two migration flyways from the breeding grounds in Kazakhstan; a longer western route (c. 5200 km) west through southern Russia, then south through the Caucasus to wintering areas in Saudi Arabia and eastern Sudan, and a shorter eastern route (c. 2800 km) south through Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan to wintering areas in Pakistan and north-western India. The migration strategy is characterised by infrequent long-distance movements followed by often lengthy stopovers in a small number of staging areas that are used consistently across years, and by high individual and low between-individual consistency in spatial and temporal patterns of movement. At least four main autumn stopover areas and one additional spring stopover area were identified along the western route, but only one autumn and one spring staging area along the eastern route. There was no relationship between latitude or longitude of breeding and the migration route used, and the same breeding colonies could contain breeding adults and produce chicks of both flyway populations, suggesting that no clear migratory divide exists within the breeding range. Sociable Lapwings spend around a third of the year on their breeding grounds, a third on their wintering grounds and a third moving between them. Birds were highly faithful to passage and wintering sites, but showed low fidelity to breeding sites. Stopover areas and wintering sites are usually located at the interface of dry steppe-like or desert habitats and agriculture, particularly irrigated cropland along rivers. This species selects agricultural habitats throughout its entire life cycle, and its heavy reliance on some of the world’s most anciently cultivated regions suggests that this synanthropic relationship may have evolved over millennia. The recent emergence of irrigated agriculture in the deserts of Arabia allows birds using the western route to winter far north of their previous wintering range and maybe to spread into new wintering areas along the coasts of the Arabian Gulf. The concentration of large numbers of birds at a small number of traditional stopover areas offers the opportunity to quantify the global population size, which we estimate at around 24,000 individuals (95% CL 13,700–55,560). However, it also makes the species particularly vulnerable to hunting and small-scale habitat change. Illegal hunting along the western flyway is identified as the most likely driver of the species’ decline.

Carcasses of common pheasants (Phasianus colchicus) killed by hunters using shotguns are widely used or sold in the United Kingdom and elsewhere for human consumption. Almost all of the birds are shot using shotgun pellets composed principally of lead (Pb). Lead shotgun pellets often fragment on impact within the bodies of gamebirds, leaving small lead particles in the meat that are difficult for consumers to detect and remove and from which a greater proportion of lead is likely to be absorbed. Chronic exposure to even low levels of lead is associated with negative health effects in humans and especially in groups particularly vulnerable to the effects of lead, which include young children and pregnant women. Our study used a high-resolution computerised tomography X-ray scanner to locate, in three dimensions, metal fragments embedded within carcasses of eight pheasants sold for human consumption in the UK. Small radio-dense fragments (

After suffering a massive decline (~ 99%) in numbers caused by feeding on livestock carcasses containing the nephrotoxic drug diclofenac, critically endangered Gyps vultures now persist in low numbers in the Indian subcontinent. Most are concentrated near National Parks, likely due to availability of wild carcasses free from toxic veterinary drugs. Quantification of vulture diets is critical to test this hypothesis. We describe a validated “field-to-benchtop-to-desktop” metabarcoding workflow for assessing species- and sex-specific diet of these obligate scavengers from non-invasively collected faecal samples. Seven metabarcodes were designed to simultaneouslsy identify the vulture species, sex and diet. Amplicons generated from multiplex PCRs were indexed and sequenced on an Illumina Miseq platform. We included controls and three replicates per sample to establish a series of non-arbitrary thresholds to filter the sequence data and eliminate cross-contamination, PCR/sequencing errors and false positives. This strategy enabled identification of species and sex for all samples and diet-specific sequences with high taxonomic resolution for 97% of samples. Just four (two for diet, one each for vulture species and sexing) metabarcodes were sufficient to meet the objectives. This preliminary analysis suggests that domestic livestock is the most frequently consumed diet item across samples from inside and outside protected habitats. Our method provides a rapid and reliable tool for describing large-scale variation in consumption of domestic versus wild species in the diet of these scavengers, paving the way for a better understanding of the role protected areas play in persistence and recovery of the remaining Gyps vultures in the wild.

The critically endangered Spoon-billed Sandpiper Calidris pygmaea breeds in Russia and winters between Bangladesh and China. World population estimates during 2014–2019 suggested a decline at a mean rate of 8% per year. Several surveys of local populations also indicated declines. We report a rapid decline of another local population of the species based on a 9-year series of annual surveys during the boreal winter at Sonadia Island, Chattogram Division, Bangladesh. We made bounded-count estimates of local populations of the Spoon-billed Sandpiper and 25 other shorebird species based on monthly counts in each of nine winters (2012/2013 to 2020/2021). For three of these winters (2017/2018 to 2019/2020), we also made Lincoln–Petersen estimates of the local population of Spoon-billed Sandpipers using resightings and scan surveys of individually marked birds. Population and trend estimates for the two methods were similar during the 3-year period when results from both were available. Bounded-count estimates of Spoon-billed Sandpipers declined markedly over the 9-year period. Analysis of combined data from both methods indicated that an exponential decline at a mean rate of 9.5% per year during the period 2012/2013 to 2017/2018 was followed by a much more rapid decline at 49.1% per year during 2018/2019 to 2020/2021. Bounded-count estimates of the combined population of 25 other shorebird species in each winter showed no decline during the 9-year period, which suggests that the decline in the local population of the Spoon-billed Sandpiper was not part of a general decline in populations of wintering shorebirds due to local factors. Estimates of the mean trend of other Spoon-billed Sandpiper local populations and of the world population all indicate declines at broadly similar rates. We recommend immediate reassessment of threats faced by the Spoon-billed Sandpiper and improved conservation interventions.

In 2020, nine major UK shooting and rural organisations proposed a voluntary transition from the use for hunting of lead shotgun ammunition to non-lead alternatives. The major food retailer Waitrose & Partners has announced its intention to move to not supplying game meat products from animals killed using any kind of lead ammunition and the National Game Dealers Association announced a plan for a similar policy to be implemented in 2022. The SHOT-SWITCH research project, which is intended to monitor the progress of these voluntary initiatives, began in the 2020/2021 shooting season. The project monitors changes in the proportions of wild-shot common pheasants Phasianus colchicus available to consumers in Great Britain that had been killed using lead and non-lead shotgun ammunition, as assessed by using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry to identify the composition of shotgun pellets recovered from carcasses. In 2020/2021, 99.4% of the pheasants sampled had been killed using lead ammunition. We report here further results from this study for the 2021/2022 season. We found that 99.5% of the 215 pheasants from which shotgun pellets were recovered had been killed using lead ammunition. We conclude that the shooting and rural organisations’ joint statement and two years of their considerable efforts in education, awareness-raising and promotion, have not yet had a detectable effect on the ammunition types used by hunters who supply pheasants to the British game meat market.

Throughout South Asia, cattle are regularly treated with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) and their carcasses are left for scavengers to consume. Residues of the NSAID diclofenac in cattle carcasses caused widespread mortality and catastrophic population declines in three species of Gyps vulture during the 1990s and 2000s. Diclofenac is now banned, but other NSAIDs are used in its place. Different lines of evidence, including safety testing in Gyps vultures, have shown that some of these other NSAIDs are toxic, or probably toxic, to vultures. The NSAID nimesulide is widely available and commonly used, and has been found in dead vultures with signs of renal failure (i.e. visceral gout) and without the presence of diclofenac and/or other vulture-toxic NSAIDs. Nimesulide is therefore probably toxic to vultures. Here, we report safety testing of nimesulide in Gyps vultures. In a controlled toxicity experiment, we gave two vultures the maximum likely exposure of nimesulide calculated from initial pharmacokinetic and residue experiments in cattle. Two other control birds were given an oral dose of water. Both vultures dosed with nimesulide died within 30 h, after showing outward signs of toxicity and increases in biochemical indicators of renal failure. Post-mortem examinations found extensive visceral gout in both vultures. Both control vultures survived without biochemical indicators of renal failure. With this evidence, we call for an immediate and comprehensive ban of nimesulide throughout South Asia to ensure the survival of the region’s Critically Endangered vultures. More generally, testing the impacts of drugs on non-target species should be the responsibility of the pharmaceutical industry, before their veterinary use is licensed.

Previous studies have highlighted the importance of intertidal habitats on the coast of Jiangsu Province, China for the Critically Endangered Spoon-billed Sandpiper Calidris pygmaea during the post-breeding moult. We report Lincoln-Petersen closed-population estimates of numbers of Spoon-billed Sandpipers Calidris pygmaea at the three principal sites in the region for the species: Tiaozini, Yangkou and Dongling. Our estimates were based upon resightings and scan surveys of individually-marked birds. Surveys were conducted in September–October when nearly all of the birds present were adults (≥1 yr old). We estimated the number present at Tiaozini in each of the years 2017–2020, during which numbers declined from 225 to 151, mostly between 2018 and 2019. To identify parts of the intertidal area used by Spoon-billed Sandpipers, we mapped locations of satellite-tagged birds in 2017 and 2019. Data from seven tagged birds indicated that they moved to intertidal flats up to 7 km seaward of the nearest point of the seawall at low tide. We then analysed satellite imagery for 2017–2020 for intertidal areas up to this distance from the coast and found evidence for changes in topography of the intertidal mudflats and positions of major channels. The mean extent of exposed mudflats per tidal cycle appeared to have declined by about 20% between 2017 and 2020. Surveys at two other sites in 2020 indicated that there were 26 birds at Yangkou and 63 birds at Dongling, with a total of 240 birds at all three sites combined in 2020. This is approximately half of the estimated world population of adults. The coast of Jiangsu Province is therefore of global importance for the Spoon-billed Sandpiper. Although birds no longer at Tiaozini may have been displaced to other sites, the observed population decline, which co-incided with changes in intertidal topography, raises concerns about the future conservation status of the species. Uncertainty about future changes to the topography and extent of intertidal mudflats makes the co-ordinated protection of all sites in Jiangsu Province known to hold Spoon-billed Sandpipers during the post-breeding moult period a conservation priority. This applies particularly to Tiaozini, Yangkou and Dongling, but also to other sites at which future surveys may reveal to hold concentrations of the species.

SummaryPopulations of Critically Endangered White-rumped Gyps bengalensis and Slender-billed G. tenuirostris Vultures in Nepal declined rapidly during the 2000s, almost certainly because of the effects of the use in livestock of the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug diclofenac, which is nephrotoxic to Gyps vultures. In 2006, veterinary use of diclofenac was banned in Nepal and this was followed by the gradual implementation, over most of the geographical range of the two vulture species in Nepal, of a Vulture Safe Zone (VSZ) programme to advocate vulture conservation, raise awareness about diclofenac, provide vultures with NSAID-free food and encourage the veterinary use in livestock of a vulture-safe alternative NSAID (meloxicam). We report the results of long-term monitoring of vulture populations in Nepal before and after this programme was implemented, by means of road transects. Piecewise regression analysis of the count data indicated that a rapid decline of the White-rumped Vulture population from 2002 up to about 2013 gave way to a partial recovery between about 2013 and 2018. More limited data for the Slender-billed Vulture indicated that a rapid decline also gave way to partial recovery from about 2012 onwards. The rates at which populations were increasing in the 2010s exceeded the upper end of the range of increase rates expected in a closed population under optimal conditions. The possibility that immigration from India is contributing to the changes cannot be excluded. We present evidence from open and undercover pharmacy surveys that the VSZ programme had apparently become effective in reducing the availability of diclofenac in a large part of the range of these species in Nepal by about 2011. Hence, community-based advocacy and awareness-raising actions, and possibly also provisioning of safe food, may have made an important contribution to vulture conservation by augmenting the effects of changes in the regulation of toxic veterinary drugs.

It has been known for centuries that lead is toxic to humans. Chronic exposure to lead, even at low levels, is associated with an elevated risk of cardiovascular and chronic kidney disease in adults and of impaired neurodevelopment and subsequent cognitive and behavioural development in the foetus and young children. Health agencies throughout the world have moved from assuming that there are tolerable levels of exposure to lead to a recognition that valid ‘no-effect’ thresholds cannot currently be defined. Formerly, the most important exposure pathways were occupational exposure, water from lead plumbing, paints, petrol additives and foods. Regulation of products and improved health and safety procedures at work have left dietary lead as the main remaining pathway of exposure in European countries. Ammunition-derived lead is now a significant cause of dietary lead exposure in groups of people who eat wild game meat frequently. These are mostly hunters, shoot employees and their families, but also some people who choose to eat game for ethical, health or other reasons, and their children. Extrapolation from surveys conducted in the UK and a review of studies of game consumption in other countries suggest that approximately 5 million people in the EU may be high-level consumers of lead-shot game meat and that tens of thousands of children in the EU may be consuming game contaminated with ammunition-derived lead frequently enough to cause significant effects on their cognitive development.

Empirical evidence from many regions suggests that most species would be least negatively affected if human food demand were met through high-yield agricultural production and conservation of nonfarm ecosystems (land sparing), rather than through wildlife-friendly farming over a larger area (land sharing). However, repeated glaciation and a long history of agriculture may lead to different results in regions such as western Europe. We compared the consequences of land sparing and land sharing on breeding bird species in 2 lowland regions of England, The Fens, with 101 species, and Salisbury Plain, with 83. We derived density-yield responses for each species and then estimated regional population size under regional food production strategies, including land sharing and land sparing, a range of intermediate strategies, and a novel mixed strategy. In both regions, more species achieved maximum regional population size under land sparing than land sharing. In The Fens, the majority of birds were loser species (estimated to have smaller populations under all food production strategies than in the preagricultural baseline scenario), whereas in Salisbury Plain the majority were winners (smaller populations in the preagricultural baseline scenario). Loser species overwhelmingly achieved maximum regional population size under land sparing, whereas winner species achieved maximum regional population size under either land sharing or an intermediate strategy, highlighting the importance of defining which groups of species are the target of conservation. A novel 3-compartment strategy (combining high-yield farming, natural habitat, and low-yield farming) often performed better than either land sharing or land sparing. Our results support intermediate or 3-compartment land-sparing strategies to maximize bird populations across lowland agricultural landscapes. To deliver conservation outcomes, any shift toward land sparing must, however, ensure yield increases are sustainable in the long term, do not entail increased negative effects on surrounding areas, and are linked to allocation of land for nature.Conservación de Aves y el Continuo de Suelo Compartido-Reservado en Paisajes Dominados por Tierras de Cultivo en las Tierras Bajas de Inglaterra Resumen La evidencia empírica proveniente de muchas regiones sugiere que la mayoría de las especies se verían menos afectadas negativamente si se cumpliera con la demanda humana de alimentos por medio de una producción agrícola de alto rendimiento y la conservación de ecosistemas no agrícolas (dosificación de suelo) en lugar de hacerlo a través de la agricultura amigable con la fauna en un área mayor (partición de suelo). Sin embargo, la glaciación repetitiva y una larga historia agrícola podrían brindar diferentes resultados en regiones como Europa occidental. Comparamos las consecuencias de la dosificación y la partición de suelo sobre especies de aves en reproducción en dos regiones de tierras bajas en Inglaterra: Los Fens, con 101 especies, y la Planicie Salisbury, con 83 especies. Derivamos las respuestas con densidad de rendimiento para cada especie y después estimamos el tamaño poblacional regional bajo estrategias regionales de producción de alimentos, incluyendo la dosificación y la partición de suelo, una gama de estrategias intermedias y una novedosa estrategia mixta. En ambas regiones, más especies alcanzaron el tamaño poblacional máximo para la región bajo la dosificación del suelo que bajo la partición del suelo. En Los Fens, la mayoría de las aves fueron especies perdedoras (se estimó que tendrían tamaños poblacionales menores bajo todas las estrategias de producción de alimento que en el escenario pre-agrícola de la línea base) mientras que en la Planicie Salisbury, la mayoría de las especies fueron ganadoras (con poblaciones más pequeñas en el escenario pre-agrícola de la línea base). Las especies perdedoras tuvieron abrumadoramente un tamaño poblacional máximo para la región bajo la dosificación de suelo, mientras que las especies ganadoras tuvieron este máximo poblacional bajo la partición de suelo o alguna estrategia intermedia, lo que resalta la importancia de la definición de cuáles grupos de especies son el objetivo de conservación. Una estrategia novedosa de tres compartimentos (combina la agricultura de alto rendimiento, el hábitat natural y la agricultura de bajo rendimiento) muchas veces tuvo un mejor desempeño que la dosificación o la partición del suelo. Nuestros resultados respaldan a las estrategias de dosificación de suelo intermedias o de tres compartimentos para maximizar las poblaciones de aves en todos los paisajes agrícolas de las tierras bajas. Para brindar resultados de conservación, cualquier cambio hacia la dosificación del suelo, sin embargo, debe asegurar que los incrementos en el rendimiento son sustentables a largo plazo, no conllevan un incremento de efectos negativos en las áreas circundantes, y que están vinculados a la asignación de suelo para la naturaleza.来自许多地区的经验证据表明, 如果人类通过高产农业和保护非农业生态系统的方式 (土地分离) 来满足粮食需求, 而不是通过在较大范围内开展野生动物友好型农业 (土地共享), 那么大多数物种受到的负面影响会是最小的。然而, 一些地区 (如西欧) 经历过多次冰川作用, 且有着悠久的农业历史, 可能在这个问题上有所不同。我们比较了英国两个低地地区土地分离和土地共享对繁殖鸟类的影响, 其中东部沼泽地区 (The Fens) 有 101 种鸟, 索尔斯堡平原 (Salisbury Plain) 有 83 种鸟。我们估计了每个物种的密度-产量响应关系, 并评估了各种区域粮食生产策略下鸟类的区域种群大小, 这些策略包括土地分离、土地共享、一系列中间型策略以及一种新型混合策略。在这两个地区, 较多物种在土地分离策略 (而不是土地共享策略) 下的区域种群大小最大。在沼泽地区, 大部分鸟类物种属于失败者 (据估计, 它们在任何粮食生产策略下的种群数量都低于未发展农业时的基线水平); 而索尔斯堡平原的大多数鸟类物种都是成功者 (未发展农业时的基线水平更低) 。失败物种绝大多数都在土地分离策略下可以达到最大区域种群数量, 而成功物种则会在土地共享或中间型策略下达到最大区域种群数量。这一结果突显了确定保护目标中鸟类类型的重要性。此外, 还存在一种新型的三区分隔策略 (结合了高产农业、自然生境和低产农业), 它的效果往往比单一的土地分离或土地共享更好。我们的结果支持选择中间型或三区分隔型土地分离策略, 以求在低地农业景观中使鸟类种群数量最大化。然而, 要取得保护成效, 还应确保在向土地分离策略的转型中, 产量的增长可长期持续、不会为周围地区带来更多负面影响, 且与自然用地的分配相关联。【翻译: 胡怡思; 审校: 聂永刚】.

Land sparing has been proposed as a strategy to reconcile biodiversity conservation with agricultural production, with empirical studies on five continents indicating that most species would benefit if food demand was met through high‐yield farming combined with the protection or restoration of natural habitat. Most such studies come from landscapes covered by large areas of natural habitat and without a long history of intense human modification. However, much of Europe consists of human‐dominated landscapes, where biodiversity responses to land sparing may differ. To test this, we use estimates of bird population density in different (semi‐)natural habitats, and forecasts of population density in farmland habitat, to assess the future consequences for birds of land‐sparing scenarios in the United Kingdom. Our scenarios predict that whilst up to 18 of the 156 species assessed (predominantly farmland associated species) might decline in UK conservation status under land sparing, up to 35 UK bird species (mainly woodland and wetland species) might improve in status. This contrasts with a maximum of eight species likely to improve in conservation status without land sparing, with up to seven species deteriorating. Combining land sparing with demand management measures (reducing food waste and the consumption of animal products) led to more positive population changes under all scenarios. Synthesis and applications. Land sparing has the potential to benefit UK bird populations in aggregate but would likely have negative impacts on farmland bird species. These findings are likely to be applicable across human‐dominated landscapes beyond the UK, though effects on other taxa, implementation mechanisms and the sustainability of higher yields all require careful consideration.

Funder: Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Funder: British Birdfair/RSPB Fund for Endangered Species, Funder: African Bird Club; funder-id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100014663, Funder: British Ornithologists’ Union; funder-id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100008023, Funder: Cambridge Philosophical Society; funder-id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100013858, Funder: Tim Whitmore Fund, Funder: Worts Travelling Scholars Fund, Funder: Magdalene College, University of Cambridge; funder-id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000653, Climate change is having profound effects on the distributions of species globally. Trait-based assessments predict that specialist and range-restricted species are among those most likely to be at risk of extinction from such changes. Understanding individual species’ responses to climate change is therefore critical for informing conservation planning. We use an established Species Distribution Modelling (SDM) protocol to describe the curious range-restriction of the globally threatened White-tailed Swallow (Hirundo megaensis) to a small area in southern Ethiopia. We find that, across a range of modelling approaches, the distribution of this species is well described by two climatic variables, maximum temperature and dry season precipitation. These same two variables have been previously found to limit the distribution of the unrelated but closely sympatric Ethiopian Bush-crow (Zavattariornis stresemanni). We project the future climatic suitability for both species under a range of climate scenarios and modelling approaches. Both species are at severe risk of extinction within the next half century, as the climate in 68–84% (for the swallow) and 90–100% (for the bush-crow) of their current ranges is predicted to become unsuitable. Intensive conservation measures, such as assisted migration and captive-breeding, may be the only options available to safeguard these two species. Their projected disappearance in the wild offers an opportunity to test the reliability of SDMs for predicting the fate of wild species. Monitoring future changes in the distribution and abundance of the bush-crow is particularly tractable because its nests are conspicuous and visible over large distances.

In Europe, vulture recovery has been an important conservation success story (1). This success may now be jeopardized by the use of diclofenac in Europe’s pastoral landscapes. Although diclofenac had already caused a rapid and catastrophic 95% decline in Asian vulture populations (2), the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug was approved for veterinary use in Spain in 2013 (3). Although measures for the safe disposal of carcasses of livestock treated with diclofenac are supposed to prevent avian scavengers from feeding on contaminated carrion (4), a Spanish cinereous vulture (Aegypius monachus) was found dead,poisoned with diclofenac (5), in September 2020. European regulatory authorities should permanently ban diclofenac use in livestock before the tragedy met by Asian vultures repeats itself in Europe.

Vultures and condors are among the most threatened avian species in the world due to the impacts of human activities. Negative perceptions can contribute to these threats as some vulture species have been historical ly blamed for killing livestock. This perception of confli ct has increased in recent years, associated with a viral spread of partial and biased information through social media and despite limited empirical support for these assertions. Here, we highlight that magnifying infrequent events of livestock being injured by vultures through publically shared videos or biased news items negatively impact efforts to conserve threatened populations of avian scavengers. We encourage environmental agencies, researchers, and practitioners to evaluate the reliability, frequency, and context of reports of vulture preda tion, weighing those results against the diverse and valuable contributions of vultures to environmental health and human well-being. We also encoura ge the development of awareness campaigns and improved livestock management practices, including commonly available nonlethal deterrence strategies, if needed. These actions are urgently required to allow the development of a more effective conservation strategy for vultures worldwide.

Assessments of conservation status are typically based on short-term extinction risk, but the value of indicators that compare the current state of species (e.g., abundance or distribution) to potential baselines is increasingly recognised. The use of baselines in conservation legislation is hindered by ambiguity in how baselines should be determined and interpreted, leading to inconsistent application. Here, we explored the use of species’ potential ranges as a consistent means of quantifying baselines for assessing species’ distributions, a key component of conservation status. Using breeding birds of Great Britain (GB) as a case study, we simulated where bird species would be expected to occur today in a modelled world without human land use. We calculated indices that contrasted these potential human-free ranges with realised ranges. Our analyses revealed that 42% of GB birds have wider realised than potential ranges and 28% have narrower realised than potential ranges. These indices could lead to reassessments of current conservation priorities. Eighteen species assigned ‘least concern’ status by the GB regional IUCN Red List had much narrower realised than potential ranges, suggesting that their ranges are in a more degraded state than currently recognised by Red List criteria. Some of these species are not under active conservation management and could be candidates for higher prioritisation. Our approach provides a systematic means of quantifying range baselines that is not reliant on variable historic data or expert opinion and, thereby, provides a step forward in resolving a major contemporary problem in conservation assessment: how to set baselines in conservation consistently. The insights produced are also of wider scientific and cultural relevance, revealing where species would likely exist today in the absence of historic human impacts. This could be used to identify areas where targeted restoration actions might lead to the return of historically extirpated species, or even to novel colonists.

A single formal estimate of the size of the world population of the Critically Endangered Spoon-billed Sandpiper Calidris pygmaea has been published. This used a Lincoln-Petersen method, which combined a global mark-resighting analysis with a scan survey to estimate the proportion of birds with individual marks observed at a post-breeding moult and migration stopover site in Jiangsu Province, China. We report nine further repetitions of this procedure, which we call Method A, giving ten world population estimates in all, during the 6-year period 2014–2019. Four of these estimates use scan surveys from Jiangsu in the post-breeding adult moult period and six are from the non-breeding season (November–February) at three widely-separated sites in Bangladesh, Myanmar and South China. The weighted mean world population size at the end of the breeding season, based upon all ten surveys, was 490 mature individuals (95% C.L. 360–620) and 773 individuals of all ages (95% C.L. 569–978), which is similar to the single previous Method A estimate (420 mature individuals), but considerably more precise. We also report results from two independent but low-precision methods: one based upon published non-breeding season counts and the non-breeding season localities of satellite-tagged birds (Method B) and the other based upon mark-recapture analysis of birds marked as unfledged chicks and recaptured as migrating juveniles (Method C). These two methods gave estimates within the range 471 to 922 mature individuals, depending upon assumptions. The trend of Method A population size estimates with time during the short study period was a decline at a mean rate of 8% per year, but this did not differ significantly from zero (no change). The precision of this estimate of population trend was low, but its rate is of similar magnitude to the 9% per year decline during 2009–2016, derived from surveys of the local population at the most important known non-breeding season site in Myanmar. Hence, although the rapid population decline indicated by surveys of breeding populations observed prior to 2009 (mean 26% decline per year) has probably slowed as a result of conservation efforts, our results indicate that the species should continue to be listed as Critically Endangered.

1. Understanding how to allocate land for the sustainable delivery of multiple, competing objectives is a major societal challenge. The land sharing‐sparing framework presents a heuristic for understanding the trade‐off between food production and biodiversity conservation by comparing region‐wide land‐use scenarios which are equivalent in terms of overall food production. 2. Here, for two contrasting regions of lowland England (The Fens and Salisbury Plain), we use empirical data and predictive models to compare a suite of spatially explicit scenarios reflecting the full range of the sharing‐sparing continuum, including mixed scenarios which combine elements of both sharing and sparing. We evaluate a range of outcomes (bird populations, global warming potential (GWP), nitrogen and phosphorus pollution and outdoor recreation), to identify approaches to regional land‐use planning with the potential to deliver multiple societal benefits. 3. Land‐sharing scenarios (which reduce the dominance of productive agricultural land in farmed areas and the area of larger unfarmed areas) result in negative outcomes, particularly for birds and GWP. In contrast, many land‐sparing scenarios (including mixed scenarios which increase the area of lower‐yield farmland alongside larger unfarmed areas) resulted in improvements in all or most outcomes, although for recreation and nutrient export differences between scenarios were modest. 4. Importantly, environmental outcomes also depended on the spatial arrangement of spared land, the types of natural or semi‐natural habitat promoted on spared land, whether some lower‐yield farmland is delivered alongside larger unfarmed areas, and the overall region‐wide food production target. 5. Policy implications. Our study suggests that land‐sparing strategies which increase the area of natural and semi‐natural areas can improve environmental outcomes, despite the costs associated with high‐yield agriculture. However, high‐yield agriculture should not compromise future production or the conservation value of spared land, and explicit policies such as certification or payments for ecosystem services are required to link sustainable high‐yield production to habitat conservation. Our study also highlights the importance of mitigating projected increases in food demand.

Forest loss and degradation are the greatest threats to biodiversity worldwide. Rising global wood demand threatens further damage to remaining native forests. Contrasting solutions across a continuum of options have been proposed, yet which of these offers most promise remains unresolved. Expansion of high-yielding tree plantations could free up forest land for conservation provided this is implemented in tandem with stronger policies for conserving native forests. Because plantations and other intensively managed forests often support far less biodiversity than native forests, a second approach argues for widespread adoption of extensive management, or ‘ecological forestry’, which better simulates natural forest structure and disturbance regimes – albeit with compromised wood yields and hence a need to harvest over a larger area. A third, hybrid suggestion involves ‘Triad’ zoning where the landscape is divided into three sorts of management (reserve, ecological/extensive management, and intensive plantation). Progress towards resolving which of these approaches holds the most promise has been hampered by the absence of a conceptual framework and of sufficient empirical data formally to identify the most appropriate landscape-scale proportions of reserves, extensive, and intensive management to minimize biodiversity impacts while meeting a given level of demand for wood. In this review, we argue that this central challenge for sustainable forestry is analogous to that facing food-production systems, and that the land sharing–sparing framework devised to establish which approach to farming could meet food demand at least cost to wild species can be readily adapted to assess contrasting forest management regimes. We develop this argument in four ways: (i) we set out the relevance of the sharing–sparing framework for forestry and explore the degree to which concepts from agriculture can translate to a forest management context; (ii) we make design recommendations for empirical research on sustainable forestry to enable application of the sharing–sparing framework; (iii) we present overarching hypotheses which such studies could test; and (iv) we discuss potential pitfalls and opportunities in conceptualizing landscape management through a sharing–sparing lens. The framework we propose will enable forest managers worldwide to assess trade-offs directly between conservation and wood production and to determine the mix of management approaches that best balances these (and other) competing objectives. The results will inform ecologically sustainable forest policy and management, reduce risks of local and global extinctions from forestry, and potentially improve a valuable sector's social license to operate.

There are significant negative effects of exposure to spent lead ammunition on wildlife and human health. A joint statement was issued by nine UK shooting and rural organisations on 24th February 2020 intended to encourage a voluntary transition to non-lead shotgun ammunition within five years “in consideration of wildlife, the environment and to ensure a market for the healthiest game products”. We dissected carcasses of wild-shot common pheasants Phasianus colchicus sold or offered for human consumption in Britain in the shooting season between 1st October 2020 and 1st February 2021 to recover shotgun pellets. The principal metallic element composing one pellet from each bird was identified using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry. The results showed that 99% of the 180 pheasants from which shotgun pellets were recovered had been killed using lead shotgun ammunition, compared with 100% in a much smaller study conducted in the 2008/2009 shooting season. We conclude that the shooting and rural organisations’ joint statement, and their subsequent promotional actions, have not yet had a detectable effect on the ammunition types used by shooters supplying pheasants to the British game market.

Shooting of birds using lead shotgun ammunition was legal for all quarry species in the UK until 1st September 1999, when the Environmental Protection (Restriction on Use of Lead Shot) (England) Regulations 1999 and similar regulations in other UK countries came into effect. These regulations made it illegal to shoot ducks and geese and some other waterfowl species in England with lead shotgun ammunition and/or to use it in certain wetland habitats. The legislation was intended to reduce the incidence of lead poisoning of wetland birds caused by ingested and embedded shotgun pellets. We evaluate the effectiveness of this legislation by estimating the number of ducks shot in England with lead shot. We also assess the effectiveness of awareness-raising actions about the regulations, including an advocacy campaign intended to encourage compliance, and an undertaking by the UK Government to examine ways to improve compliance and enforcement. We estimate that about 13 million ducks have been shot illegally using lead shotgun ammunition in England since 1st September 1999 - an annual average of approximately 586,000 and representing approximately 70% of the total ducks shot. There was no detectable decline in the number of ducks killed using lead shotgun ammunition following the awareness-raising publicity and advocacy campaign by shooting and countryside management organisations. The government review of implementation and enforcement of the Regulations on the level of this wildlife crime was not followed by any new prosecutions. There has been one prosecution for an offence under the Lead Shot Regulations. We conclude that the 1999 Regulations and attempts to promote compliance with them have effected only a small reduction in the use of lead shotgun ammunition in wetlands in England.

Critically Endangered Spoon-billed Sandpipers Calidris pygmaea migrate from their breeding grounds in arctic and subarctic Russia along the East Asian-Australasian Flyway to winter in coastal habitats in south-east Asia. To describe the use of migration stopover and wintering sites during the post-breeding migration, we tracked six adults equipped with solar-powered Platform Transmitting Terminals (PTTs) on the breeding grounds and a further seven adults tagged at a post-breeding moulting site in Jiangsu Province, China. We identified 28 clusters of sites in all, of which nine appeared to be of special importance for refuelling for onward migration, or the post-breeding moult of flight feathers. In particular, we identified three sites in Russia that were used by tagged birds for prolonged periods of time prior to long migratory movements to the moulting grounds (Perevalochni Bay, Moroshechnaya River and Tyk Bay), three sites used during the period of flight feather moult (Rongmae Mudflat in DPRK; Tiaozini and Yangkou in Jiangsu Province, China) and three stopover sites used for long periods followed by long onward flights after the moult of flight feathers (Shanghai Chongming Donglin and Nandu Estuary, Leizhou in China and Ha Nam Island in Vietnam). In addition, wintering areas of eight tagged birds were identified, of which three were in China (Xitou Yangxi, Guankoudu Zhaoan and Xichang Hepu), one in Vietnam (Ha Nam Island), one in Myanmar (Gulf of Mottama), two in Bangladesh (Jahajja Char North and an area nearby) and one in Indonesia (Northern Sumatra). Ten of the 28 stopover and wintering sites identified have statutory protection.

Ingestion of lead (Pb) derived from ammunition used in the hunting of game animals is recognised to be a significant potential source of Pb exposure of wild birds, including birds of prey. However, there are only limited data for birds of prey in Europe regarding tissue concentrations and origins of Pb. Eurasian buzzards (Buteo buteo) found dead in the United Kingdom during an 11-year period were collected and the concentrations of Pb in the liver and femur were measured. Concentrations in the liver consistent with acute exposure to Pb were found in 2.7% of birds and concentration in the femur consistent with exposure to lethal levels were found in 4.0% of individuals. Pb concentration in the femur showed no evidence of consistent variation among or within years, but was greater for old than for young birds. The Pb concentration in the liver showed no effect of the birds’ age, but varied markedly among years and showed a consistent tendency to increase substantially within years throughout the UK hunting season for gamebirds. The resemblance of the stable isotope composition of Pb from buzzard livers to that of Pb from the types of shotgun ammunition most widely-used in the UK increased markedly with increasing Pb concentration in the liver. Stable isotope results were consistent with 57% of the mass of Pb in livers of all of the buzzards sampled being derived from shotgun pellets, with this proportion being 89% for the birds with concentrations indicating acute exposure to Pb. Hence, most of the Pb acquired by Eurasian buzzards which have liver concentrations likely to be associated with lethal and sublethal effects is probably obtained when they prey upon or scavenge gamebirds and mammals shot using Pb shotgun pellets., Mónica Martinez-Haro was supported by the JCCM and the European Regional Development Fund (SBPLY/17/180501/000514).

SummaryThe Spoon-billed Sandpiper Calidris pygmaea is a ‘Critically Endangered’ migratory shorebird. The species faces an array of threats in its non-breeding range, making conservation intervention essential. However, conservation efforts are reliant on identifying the species’ key stopover and wintering sites. Using Maximum Entropy models, we predicted Spoon-billed Sandpiper distribution across the non-breeding range, using data from recent field surveys and satellite tracking. Model outputs suggest only a limited number of stopover sites are suitable for migrating birds, with sites in the Yellow Sea and on the Jiangsu coast in China highlighted as particularly important. All the previously known core wintering sites were identified by the model including the Ganges-Brahmaputra Delta, Nan Thar Island and the Gulf of Mottama. In addition, the model highlighted sites subsequently found to be occupied, and pinpointed potential new sites meriting investigation, notably on Borneo and Sulawesi, and in parts of India and the Philippines. A comparison between the areas identified as most likely to be occupied and protected areas showed that very few locations are covered by conservation designations. Known sites must be managed for conservation as a priority, and potential new sites should be surveyed as soon as is feasible to assess occupancy status. Site protection should take place in concert with conservation interventions including habitat management, discouraging hunting, and fostering alternative livelihoods.

Each year, hunters from 12 of the 27 European Union (EU) countries and the UK shoot over 6 million large game mammals, 12 million rabbits and hares and over 80 million birds. They support an international game meat market worth over 1.1 thousand million Euros. Animals shot with lead ammunition frequently contain lead fragments in the carcass which contaminate meals made from game meat with concentrations of lead substantially above the maximum allowable level (ML) set by European Commission Regulation EC1881/2006 for meat from domesticated animals. This poses a health risk to frequent consumers of wild-shot game meat, with children and pregnant women being particularly vulnerable. Total replacement of lead rifle and shotgun ammunition with available non-toxic alternatives is needed for all hunting in EU nations to prevent exposure of humans and wildlife to ammunition-derived lead and to allow the depletion of the long-term environmental legacy of lead from spent ammunition. We propose that EC1881/2006 is amended to incorporate an ML for game meats as a supplementary measure to the replacement of lead ammunition. This would harmonise food safety standards for lead in meats traded across and imported into the EU.

Population declines of the critically endangered Sociable Lapwing are probably due to high mortality along its migration routes or on its wintering grounds, both of which are very poorly known. We therefore undertook a long-term study of the species’ movements using satellite tagging, colour-ringing and targeted field surveys. We also compiled a database of historical and recent sightings of the species from published and unpublished sources. There were two migration flyways from the breeding grounds in Kazakhstan, along which birds used different staging strategies. A longer western route (c. 5200 km) takes birds west to southern Russia, then south through the Caucasus and the Levant to wintering areas in Saudi Arabia and eastern Sudan. A shorter eastern route (c. 2800 km) takes birds south to Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, then over the mountains of northern Afghanistan to wintering areas in Pakistan and north-western India. In spring, birds of the western flyway cut out the Caucasus by making a direct crossing of the Caspian Sea from Azerbaijan. The migration strategy is characterised by infrequent long-distance movements followed by often lengthy stopovers in a small number of staging areas that are used consistently across years, and by high individual and low between-individual consistency in patterns of movement, both spatially and temporally. At least four main autumn stopover areas and one additional spring stopover area were identified along the longer western route, but only one autumn and one spring staging area along the eastern route. There was no relationship between latitude or longitude of capture for tagging or colour ringing and the subsequent migration route used, and the same breeding colonies could contain breeding adults and produce chicks of both flyway populations, suggesting that no clear migratory divide exists within the breeding range. Sociable Lapwings spend around a third of the year on their breeding grounds, a third on their wintering grounds and a third moving between them. Birds were highly faithful to their passage and wintering sites, but showed low fidelity to breeding sites. The migration stopover areas and the wintering sites are usually located at the interface of agriculture, particularly irrigated cropland along rivers, and dry steppe-like or desert habitats. This species selects, and perhaps relies upon, agricultural habitats throughout its entire life cycle, and its heavy reliance on some of the world’s most anciently cultivated regions suggests that this synanthropic relationship may have evolved over many millennia. The recent emergence of irrigated cropfields in Arabia is likely to have allowed birds using the western route to winter well north of their previous wintering range and maybe to spread into new wintering areas along the coasts of the Arabian Gulf. The concentration of large numbers of birds at a small number of traditional but unprotected migration stopover areas offers the opportunity to quantify and monitor the global population size, for which we derive a tentative estimate of c. 24,000 individuals (95% CL: 13,700 – 55,560). However, it also makes the species particularly vulnerable to hunting and small-scale habitat change. Illegal hunting along the western flyway is identified as the most plausible driver of the species’ decline.

We propose a new approach to quantifying a minimum threshold value for the size of an animal population, below which that population might be categorised as having unfavourable status. Under European Union law, the concept of Favourable Conservation Status requires assessment of populations as having favourable or unfavourable status, but quantitative methods for such assessments have not yet been developed. One population threshold that is well established in conservation biology is the minimum viable population (MVP) defined as the size of a small but stable population with an acceptably low risk of extinction within a specified period. Our approach combines this small-population paradigm MVP concept with a multiplier, which is a factor by which the MVP is multiplied to allow for the risk of a sustained future decline. We demonstrate this approach using data on UK breeding bird population sizes. We used 43-year time-series data for 189 species and a qualitative assessment of population trends over almost 200 years for 229 species to examine the prevalence, duration and magnitude of sustained population declines. Our study addressed the problem of underestimation of the duration and magnitude of declines caused by short runs of monitoring data by allowing for the truncation of time series. The multiplier was derived from probability distributions of decline magnitudes within a given period, adjusted for truncation. Over a surveillance period of 100 years, we estimated that there was a 10% risk across species that a sustained population decline of at least sixteen-fold would begin. We therefore suggest that, in this case, a factor of 16 could be used as the multiplier of small-population MVPs to obtain minimum threshold population sizes for favourable status. We propose this 'MVP Multiplier' method as a new and robust approach to obtaining minimum threshold population sizes which integrates the concepts of small-population and declining-population paradigms. The minimum threshold value we propose is intended for use alongside a range of other measures to enable overall assessments of favourable conservation status.

Conservation science is a crisis-oriented discipline focused on delivering robust answers to reducing human impacts on nature. To explore how the field might have changed during the past two decades, we analyzed 3,245 applications for oral presentations submitted to the Student Conference on Conservation Science (SCCS) in Cambridge, UK. SCCS has been running every year since 2000, aims for global representation by providing bursaries to early-career conservationists from lower-income countries, and has never had a thematic focus, beyond conservation in the broadest sense. We found that the majority of submissions to SCCS were based on primary biological data collection from local scale field studies in the tropics, contrary to established literature which highlights gaps in tropical research. Our results showed a small increase over time in submissions framed around how nature benefits people as well as a small increase in submissions integrating social science. Our findings also suggest that students and early-career conservationists could provide pathways to increased availability of data from the tropics and for addressing well-known biases in the published literature towards wealthier countries. We hope this research will motivate efforts to support student projects, ensuring data and results are published and made publicly available.

Population declines of Gyps vultures across the Indian subcontinent were caused by unintentional poisoning by the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) diclofenac. Subsequently, a number of other NSAIDs have been identified as toxic to vultures, while one, meloxicam, is safe at concentrations likely to be encountered by vultures in the wild. Other vulture-safe drugs need to be identified to reduce the use of those toxic to vultures. We report on safety-testing experiments on the NSAID tolfenamic acid on captive vultures of three Gyps species, all of which are susceptible to diclofenac poisoning. Firstly, we estimated the maximum level of exposure (MLE) of wild vultures and gave this dose to 38 Near Threatened G. himalayensis by oral gavage, with 15 control birds dosed with benzyl alcohol (the carrier solution for tolfenamic acid). Two birds given tolfenamic acid died with elevated uric acid levels and severe visceral gout, while the remainder showed no adverse clinical or biochemical signs. Secondly, four G. himalayensis were fed tissues from water buffaloes which had been treated with double the recommended veterinary dose of tolfenamic acid prior to death and compared to two birds fed uncontaminated tissue; none suffered any clinical effects. Finally, two captive Critically Endangered vultures, one G. bengalensis and one G. Indicus, were given the MLE dose by gavage and compared to two control birds; again, none suffered any clinical effects. The death of two G. himalayensis may have been an anomaly due to i) the high dose level used and ii) the high ambient temperatures at the time of the experiment. Tolfenamic acid is likely to be safe to Gyps vultures at concentrations encountered by wild birds and could therefore be promoted as a safe alternative to toxic NSAIDs. It is manufactured in the region, and is increasingly being used to treat livestock.

Throughout South Asia, cattle are regularly treated with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) and their carcasses are left for scavengers to consume. Residues of the NSAID diclofenac in cattle carcasses caused widespread mortality and catastrophic population declines in three species of Gyps vulture during the 1990s and 2000s. Diclofenac is now banned, but other NSAIDs are used in its place. Different lines of evidence, including safety testing in Gyps vultures, have shown that some of these other NSAIDs are toxic, or probably toxic, to vultures. The NSAID nimesulide is widely available and commonly used, and has been found in dead vultures with signs of renal failure (i.e. visceral gout) and without the presence of diclofenac and/or other vulture-toxic NSAIDs. Nimesulide is therefore probably toxic to vultures. Here, we report safety testing of nimesulide in Gyps vultures. In a controlled toxicity experiment, we gave two vultures the maximum likely exposure (MLE) of nimesulide calculated from initial pharmacokinetic and residue experiments in cattle. Two other control birds were given an oral dose of water. Both vultures dosed with nimesulide died within 30 h, after showing outward signs of toxicity and increases in biochemical indicators of renal failure. Post-mortem examinations found extensive visceral gout in both vultures. Both control vultures survived without biochemical indicators of renal failure. With this evidence, we call for an immediate and comprehensive ban of nimesulide throughout South Asia to ensure the survival of the region's Critically Endangered vultures. More generally, testing the impacts of drugs on non-target species should be the responsibility of the pharmaceutical industry, before their veterinary use is licensed.

The spoon-billed sandpiper Calidris pygmaea, a migratory Arctic-breeding shorebird, is one of the rarest birds and its population has declined since the 1970s. We surveyed its most important known wintering area in the Upper Gulf of Mottama in Myanmar to estimate recent (2009–2016) changes in its numbers there. The total number of small shorebirds present in the Upper Gulf was counted and the proportion of them that were spoon-billed sandpipers was estimated from sample scans. These two quantities were multiplied together to give the estimated number of spoon-billed sandpipers in each of 4 years. Total numbers of combined small shorebird species tripled from 21,000 to 63,000 between 2009 and 2016, coincident with efforts to reduce hunting pressure on waterbirds. However, the proportion of small shorebirds that were spoon-billed sandpipers declined and their estimated absolute numbers fell by about half, from 244 to 112 individuals. It is probable that loss of intertidal habitat and shorebird hunting elsewhere on the migration route of the spoon-billed sandpipers wintering at Mottama is causing a continued decline, although this is occurring at a less rapid rate than that recorded from Arctic Russia before 2010. The number of spoon-billed sandpipers wintering on the Upper Gulf of Mottama remains the highest single-site total for this species from any known wintering site. Preventing resurgence of illegal shorebird hunting and ensuring long-term protection of the intertidal feeding habitats and roost sites in the Gulf are high priorities if extinction of this species is to be averted.

During the Quaternary, large climate oscillations had profound impacts on the distribution, demography and diversity of species globally. Birds offer a special opportunity for studying these impacts because surveys of geographical distributions, publicly-available genetic sequence data, and the existence of species with adaptations to life in structurally different habitats, permit large-scale comparative analyses. We use Bayesian Skyline Plot (BSP) analysis of mitochondrial DNA to reconstruct profiles depicting how effective population size (Ne) may have changed over time, focussing on variation in the effect of the last deglaciation among 102 Holarctic species. Only 3 species showed a decline inNesince the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) and 7 showed no sizeable change, whilst 92 profiles revealed an increase inNe. Using bioclimatic Species Distribution Models (SDMs), we also estimated changes in species potential range extent since the LGM. Whilst most modelled ranges also increased, we found no correlation across species between the magnitude of change in range size and change inNe. The lack of correlation between SDM and BSP reconstructions could not be reconciled even when range shifts were considered. We suggest the lack of agreement between these measures might be linked to changes in population densities which can be independent of range changes. We caution that interpreting either SDM or BSPs independently is problematic and potentially misleading. Additionally, we found thatNeof wetland species tended to increase later than species from terrestrial habitats, possibly reflecting a delayed increase in the extent of this habitat type after the LGM.

Veterinary medicines can be extremely damaging to the environment, as seen with the catastrophic declines in Gyps vulture in South Asia due to their secondary exposure to diclofenac in their primary food source. Not surprisingly, concern has been raised over other similar drugs. In this study, we evaluate the toxicity of carprofen to the Gyps vulture clade through plasma pharmacokinetics evaluations in Bos taurus cattle (their food source) and Gyps africanus (a validated model species); tissue residues in cattle; and the effect of carprofen as a secondary toxicant as both tissue-bound residue or pure drug at levels expected in cattle tissues. Carprofen residues were highest in cattle kidney (7.72 ± 2.38 mg/kg) and injection site muscle (289.05 ± 98.96 mg/kg of dimension of 5 × 5 × 5 cm). Vultures exposed to carprofen as residues in the kidney tissue or pure drug equivalents showed no toxic signs. When exposed to average injection site concentrations (64 mg/kg) one of two birds died with evidence of severe renal and liver damage. Toxicokinetic analysis revealed a prolonged drug half-life of 37.75 h in the dead bird as opposed to 13.99 ± 5.61 h from healthy birds dosed intravenously at 5 mg/kg. While carprofen may generally be harmless to Gyps vultures, its high levels at the injection site in treated cattle can result in lethal exposure in foraging vultures, due to relative small area of tissue it is found therein. We thus suggest that carprofen not be used in domesticated ungulates in areas where carcasses are accessible or provided to vultures at supplementary feeding sites.

In the version of this Article originally published, ammonia and NO emissions (and associated N deposition), nitrate leaching, and the CO emitted during urea hydrolysis following application to land were all accidentally omitted in the comparison of the greenhouse gas impacts of using ammonium nitrate and urea to produce wheat grain.

For ground-nesting and colonial bird species, predation of eggs and chicks can exert a strong negative effect on population growth and recovery. For declining populations of waders breeding on lowland wet grassland predation management tools are available to reduce the impacts of mammalian predators (e.g. lethal control, exclusion) but potential solutions are limited when raptors, which are often themselves protected by law and not easily excluded, are responsible for predation. Diversionary feeding (DF), where predators are provided with alternative food to replace the target prey species in their diet, has been tested successfully by providing food close to nesting raptor pairs to target specific individuals. Where many individuals are involved in predation at a single prey colony, or where locating or accessing nests is difficult, provisioning DF close to the focal prey colony may be a more practical solution. Here, we test the efficacy of providing DF in this way to reduce predation by red kites, a reintroduced and increasingly abundant protected raptor in the UK, on the chicks of northern lapwing, an internationally declining wader species. We conducted a five-year field experiment, comparing kite predation rates and breeding productivity of lapwings in years before, during and after DF. Rates of kite predation on lapwing chicks were substantially and significantly reduced in DF years due to the successful elimination of a May-June peak in kite predation by DF which coincided with the kite chick provisioning and lapwing chick rearing periods. These annual reductions in kite predatory strike rates were concurrent with marked increases in overall annual lapwing productivity, which more than doubled on average in DF years and were on a scale sufficient to facilitate lapwing population recovery. DF attracted other potential predators of lapwing eggs and chicks, and more kites were attracted to feeding stations than were initially targeted by DF, but neither had any measurable impact on lapwing breeding success during DF years or after its cessation. With increasing populations of many raptor species, predator-prey conservation conflicts are expected to increase. DF proved to be a highly effective predation management tool for a high-density wader colony on lowland wet grassland where intensive kite predation limited breeding success. Although evaluation of the effects of using DF continuously over several years is needed, targeting multiple predator individuals close to the focal prey of conservation concern may be an important predation management tool where accessing individual raptors at nest sites is impractical.

Aim: Climate and land use change are among the most important threatening processes driving biodiversity loss, especially in the tropics. Although the potential impacts of each threat have been widely studied in isolation, few studies have assessed the impacts of climate and land cover change in combination. Here, we evaluate the exposure of a large mammalian clade, bats, to multiple scenarios of environmental change and dispersal to understand potential consequences for biodiversity conservation. / Location: Mexico. / Methods: We used ensemble species distribution models to forecast changes in environmental suitability for 130 bat species that occur in Mexico by 2050s under four dispersal assumptions and four combined climate and land use change scenarios. We identified regions with the strongest projected impacts for each scenario and assessed the overlap across scenarios. / Results: The combined effects of climate and land use change will cause an average reduction in environmental suitability for 51% of the species across their range, regardless of scenario. Overall, species show a mean decrease in environmental suitability in at least 46% of their current range in all scenarios of change and dispersal. Climate scenarios had a higher impact on species environmental suitability than land use scenarios. There was a spatial overlap of 43% across the four environmental change scenarios for the regions projected to have the strongest impacts. / Main conclusions: Combined effects of future environmental change may result in substantial declines in environmental suitability for Mexican bats even under optimistic scenarios. This study highlights the vulnerability of megadiverse regions and an indicator taxon to human disturbance. The consideration of combined threats can make an important difference in how we react to changes to conserve our biodiversity as they pose different challenges.