Search the SPREP Catalogue

44 result(s) found.

Sort by

Publication Year
Sort results by
Created
Sort results by
Updated
Sort results by

You searched for

Tags / Keywords iucn red list
X
Tags / Keywords iguana
X

Maximising conservation impact by prioritising islands for biosecurity

Available Online

Bambini, L.

Dawson, J.

Havery, S.

John, L.

Oppel, S.

Radford, E.

Varnham, K.

Invasive alien species are one of the primary threats to native biodiversity on islands worldwide, and their expansion continues due to global trade and travel. Preventing the arrival and establishment of highly successful invasive species through rigorous biosecurity is known to be more economic than the removal of these species once they have established. However, many islands around the world lack biosecurity regulations or practical measures and establishing biosecurity will require social and financial investments. Guiding these investments towards islands where native biodiversity is at highest risk from potential invasions is of strategic importance to maximise conservation benefit with limited resources. Here we implement an established prioritisation approach, previously used to identify which islands will have the greatest conservation gains from the eradication of invasive species, to identify which islands would benefit the most from establishing or improving biosecurity. We demonstrate this approach for 318 islands in the Caribbean UK Overseas Territories and Bermuda where we considered all threatened native terrestrial vertebrates that are vulnerable to the most harmful invasive vertebrates (black and brown rats, cats, small Indian mongoose, green iguana). The approach calculates the increase in conservation threat score resulting from anticipated negative effects of potential invaders on native biodiversity, and highlighted Sombrero (Anguilla) and Cayman Brac (Cayman Islands) as important islands where threatened reptile species would likely be eliminated if rats, feral cats or mongoose invaded. Feasibility and cost implications should now be investigated more closely on the highlighted islands. The prioritisation presented here can be expanded to more islands and more invasive/native taxa (herbivores, plants and invertebrates), but requires a classification of the severity of potential impacts between invasive and native species for which currently little information exists. Besides highlighting opportunities for biosecurity, this approach also highlights where knowledge gaps about population sizes of and threats to reptiles with restricted ranges exist.

Loss of interest intactness elevates global extinction risk in birds.

Available Online

Arendarczyk, B

Buchanan, G M

Donald, P F

Spooner, F

Only around a third of the worlds remaining forest cover survives in the form of Intact Forest Landscapes (IFL), and that proportion is declining.

Alien species as a driver of recent extinctions.

Available Online

Bellard, C.

Blackburn, T.

Cassey, P.

We assessed the prevalence of alien species as a driver of recent extinctions in five major taxa (plants, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals), using data from the IUCN Red List. Our results show that alien species are the second most common threat associated with species that have gone completely extinct from these taxa since AD 1500. Aliens are the most common threat associated with extinctions in three of the five taxa analysed, and for vertebrate extinctions overall.

Wetlands of Wallis and Futuna.

Island and Ocean Ecosystems, BRB

Available Online

Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme.

In 2014, with support from the French Government, Wallis and Futuna informed SPREP of its intention to identify nationally significant wetlands for future designation as wetlands of international importance (Ramsar Sites) under the Convention on Wetlands (Ramsar, Iran, 1971).

Bait colour and moisture do not affect bait acceptance by introduced Pacific rats (Rattus exulans) at Henderson Island, Pitcairn Islands.

Island and Ocean Ecosystems, BRB

Available Online

Bond, A.L.

McClelland, G.T.W.

OKeefe, S.

Warren, P.

Rodent eradications are a useful tool for the restoration of native biodiversity on islands, but occasionally these operations incur non-target mortality. Changes in cereal bait colour could potentially mitigate these impacts but must not compromise the eradication operation. Changing bait colour may reduce mortality of Henderson crakes (Zapornia atra), an endemic globally threatened flightless bird on Henderson Island, Pitcairn Islands, South Pacific Ocean. Crakes had high non-target mortality in a failed 2011 rat eradication operation and consumed fewer blue than green cereal pellets. We examined which cereal bait properties influenced its acceptance by captive Pacific rats (Rattus exulans) on Henderson Island. We held 82 Pacific rats from Henderson Island in captivity and provided them with non-toxic cereal bait pellets of varying properties (blue or green, moist or dry). We estimated the proportion of rats consuming bait using logistic generalised linear mixed models. We found no effect of sex, females reproductive status, bait colour or bait moisture on rats willingness to consume baits. Rats bait consumption was unaffected by cereal bait properties (colour or moisture). The use of blue bait is unlikely to affect future eradication operational success but may reduce non-target mortality of Henderson crakes. Timing cereal bait distribution in relation to precipitation may also reduce crake mortality without compromising palatability to rats.

Widespread shortfalls in protected area resourcing undermine efforts to conserve biodiversity.

Available Online

Protected areas (PAs) are a key tool in efforts to safeguard biodiversity against increasing anthropogenic threats. As signatories to the 20112020 Strategic Plan for Biodiversity, 196 nations pledged support for expansion in the extent of the global PA estate and the quality of PA management.

Globally important islands where eradicating invasive mammals will benefit highly threatened vertebrates

Available Online

Holmes, Nick D [et al.]

Earths most highly threatened terrestrial insular vertebrates (111 of 1,184 species). Of these, 107 islands were in 34 countries and territories and could have eradication projects initiated by 2020. Concentrating efforts to eradicate invasive mammals on these 107 islands would benefit 151 populations of 80 highly threatened vertebrates and make a major contribution towards achieving global conservation targets adopted by the worlds nations.

Climate change vulnerability assessment of species

Climate Change Resilience, BRB

Available Online

Akçakaya, H. Resit

Bickford, David

Carr, Jamie A.

Foden, Wendy B.

Garcia, Raquel A.

Hoffmann, Ary A.

Hole, David G.

Huntley, Brian

Martin, Tara G.

Pacifici, Michela

Pearce‐Higgins, James W.

Platts, Philip J.

Stein, Bruce A.

Thomas, Chris D.

Visconti, Piero

Watson, James E. M.

Wheatley, Christopher J.

Young, Bruce E.

Assessing species' vulnerability to climate change is a prerequisite for developing effective strategies to conserve them. The last three decades have seen exponential growth in the number of studies evaluating how, how much, why, when, and where species will be impacted by climate change. We provide an overview of the rapidly developing field of climate change vulnerability assessment (CCVA) and describe key concepts, terms, steps and considerations. We stress the importance of identifying the full range of pressures, impacts and their associated mechanisms that species face and using this as a basis for selecting the appropriate assessment approaches for quantifying vulnerability. We outline four CCVA assessment approaches, namely trait?based, correlative, mechanistic and combined approaches and discuss their use. Since any assessment can deliver unreliable or even misleading results when incorrect data and parameters are applied, we discuss finding, selecting, and applying input data and provide examples of open?access resources. Because rare, small?range, and declining?range species are often of particular conservation concern while also posing significant challenges for CCVA, we describe alternative ways to assess them. We also describe how CCVAs can be used to inform IUCN Red List assessments of extinction risk. Finally, we suggest future directions in this field and propose areas where research efforts may be particularly valuable.

www.sprep.org © 2021 - 2024. All rights reserved