Global Ecology and Conservation最新文献

{"title":"Reduced rodent-mediated seed dispersal at forest edge hinders regeneration","authors":"Xinhui Wang ,&nbsp;Linjun Zhang ,&nbsp;Xueying Huo ,&nbsp;Ganggang Zhang ,&nbsp;Fei Yu","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03571","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03571","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Nearly 20 % of the world’s remaining forests are within 100 m of an edge, and over 70 % of the world’s forests are within 1 km of a forest edge, highlighting widespread forest fragmentation in global tree cover. While forest edges, particularly those resulting from anthropogenic activities such as timber harvesting and deforestation, have been extensively studied for their ecological significance and high biodiversity, the impacts of plant-animal interactions on forest regeneration across edge-to-interior gradients remain poorly understood. We hypothesized that edge effects impede forest regeneration by disrupting rodent-mediated seed dispersal, potentially exacerbating edge influence. To test this, we examined the seed dispersal patterns of <em>Quercus wutaishanica</em> mediated by rodents across four forest edge-to-interior distance gradients (0, 20, 40, and 60 m) in Dongling Mountain, located in the Taihang Mountains of China, using a plastic-tagged seed tracking method to monitor the dispersal dynamics. The results demonstrated that distance from the forest edge significantly influenced seed dispersal and predation by rodents, with seed removal rates increasing significantly as distance from the forest edge increased. Notably, a higher proportion of seeds were intact in situ at the forest edge, while the proportion of scatter-hoarding activity was predominantly observed in the forest interior. Although seed dispersal distance exhibited a gradual increase with greater distance from the forest edge, this trend was not statistically significant. Furthermore, only one seedling survived during the following spring, located 40 m from the forest edge. These findings indicate that reduced rodent-mediated dispersal efficiency near edges creates a spatial bottleneck for regeneration, potentially exacerbating edge degradation through delayed recruitment.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03571"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143760473","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Distribution pattern and composition difference of urban spontaneous plants of multi-mountainous city","authors":"Xintong Chen ,&nbsp;Zhitai Wang","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03564","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03564","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Rapid urbanization poses a threat to regional habitat maintenance and biological conservation, while spontaneous plants provide a beneficial opportunity for sustainable urban landscape and biodiversity conservation. However, it is still unclear how the patterns and composition of spontaneous plant diversity are affected by the urban environment. Here, spontaneous plants was investigated in the built-up area of Guiyang, capital city of southwest China to explore the diversity characteristics and distribution pattern, and the response of diversity and species composition difference of spontaneous plant to urban environment conditions by generalized linear model and generalized dissimilarity model. The results showed that: (1) The species richness and Shannon-Wiener index of spontaneous plants in the study area decreased with the increase of urbanization gradient, and there was no obvious urban-rural gradient pattern in the distribution of spontaneous plants; (2) Construction age, slope and land use Shannon diversity index were significant factors affecting alpha and beta diversity of spontaneous plant. In addition, species richness was significantly responsive to elevation and population change. (3) Environmental biological and abiotic factors were stronger drivers of alpha than beta diversity, and could explain 11 % and 15 % of the variation in species richness and Shannon-Wiener index, but only 5.9 % of the variation in Bray-Curtis index. These findings help to deepen our understanding of the community evolution and ecological processes of spontaneous plants in the process of urbanization, and have important implications for urban managers and planners to realize eco-friendly cities and urban rewilding practices.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03564"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143725699","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Decadal data reveal declines, not species replacement, of salamanders under agrarian reform","authors":"Jan W. Arntzen","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03567","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03567","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Long-term data are uniquely suited to test hypotheses on processes in ecology, contemporary biogeography and conservation. I tested for species replacement among crested and marbled newts (genus <em>Triturus</em>) in western France, for which historical data showed a mutual range shift of 1 km per year. <em>Triturus</em> population sizes were estimated in 23 ponds from 1979 to the present. The data show a massive amphibian decline from pond infilling, succession and neglect, arising from the agrarian transition from cattle to arable farming. In eight persisting ponds, <em>Triturus</em> populations declined in unmanaged ponds and were stable in two managed ponds. Species composition was stable or changed in either direction. The absence of further notable species replacement is in line with population isolation by less dispersal from fewer and smaller populations in a thinning network of ponds. It is concluded that the large-scale agrarian reform that progressed over the post-World War II period intervened with, and eventually frustrated the original aim of the research project.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03567"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143747430","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Caragana versicolor shrub expansion is enhanced by moderate warming but later constrained by climate extremes in the southwestern Tibetan Plateau","authors":"Guangshuai Cui ,&nbsp;Lin Zhang ,&nbsp;Liu Yang ,&nbsp;Lamu A ,&nbsp;Zexi Ren ,&nbsp;Rita Ale ,&nbsp;Pengfei Ma ,&nbsp;Jian Sun ,&nbsp;Eryuan Liang ,&nbsp;Francisco I. Pugnaire","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03566","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03566","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Shrub expansion, widely reported in high-elevation biomes, has been typically attributed to regional climate warming. However, the effects of new climate conditions on the range shift of dry high-elevation shrublands, such as in the southwestern Tibetan Plateau, remain poorly understood. We addressed changes in the distribution of a high-elevation shrub species from dry climates, <em>Caragana versicolor</em> Benth., under future climate scenarios in the southwestern Tibetan Plateau using the Maximum Entropy model (MaxEnt) developed using 216 spatially distributed point data. Current climate data and future climate projections from five general circulation models (GCMs) were used to simulate both current and future potential habitats of <em>C. versicolor</em>. Our analysis showed that winter precipitation and temperature, summer temperature, annual and daily temperature variability accounted for 89 % variation in shaping <em>C. versicolor</em> habitat distribution. According to model estimates, the current potential habitats of <em>C. versicolor</em> (based on 1970–2000 climate data) was 18.18 × 10⁴ km². Under future climate scenarios, the potential suitable habitat of <em>C. versicolor</em> will increase by 45.16 %, 43.47 %, 37.15 %, and 44.52 % compared with current habitats by the mid-21st century (ca. 2060) under SSP126, SSP245, SSP370 and SSP585 scenarios, respectively. However, ca. 2100, potential habitats will increase only by 2.75 % compared to that in 2060 under SSP126 scenario, and will decrease by 2.03 %, 6.16 % and 15.82 % under SSP245, SSP370 and SSP585 scenarios, respectively. Our results suggested that moderate atmospheric warming is likely to contribute to <em>C. versicolor</em> expansion in the near future but, on the long run, continued warming would constrain this process in dry high-elevation systems. These data may help us anticipate the cascading effects of anthropogenic warming in these vulnerable, dry high-elevation ecosystems.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03566"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143747429","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Effect of bioturbation by plateau pika (Ochotona curzoniae) on soil carbon and nitrogen stocks in alpine meadows","authors":"Yang Yang ,&nbsp;Ruting Hua ,&nbsp;Huankun Leng ,&nbsp;Jianmin Yao ,&nbsp;Jian Yang ,&nbsp;Kong Yang","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03559","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03559","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The plateau pika (<em>Ochotona curzoniae</em>) is a predominant small burrowing herbivore that plays a vital role within the alpine meadow ecosystem of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. This investigation centered on delineating the variances in bioturbation impacts by plateau pikas on soil characteristics in alpine meadows under distinct population densities. Outcomes indicated notable discrepancies in SOC, TC, and TN levels between surface soil depth (0–10 cm) and deeper depth (10–20 cm) under different Active Burrow Density (ABD). Across different depths, SOC, TC, and TN concentrations exhibited an initial rise followed by a decline with escalating Active Burrow Density (ABD), reaching peaks within the range of 240–330 burrows per hectare. Additionally, SOC and TN levels displayed synchronized fluctuations across different depths, while TC levels did not exhibit such synchronicity; TC content in deeper depth lagged behind that in surface depth. Moreover, surface soil stoichiometry (C:N ratio) diminished with heightened ABD, whereas deeper depth exhibited an opposing trend. These findings underscore how plateau pika bioturbation reshape nutrient distribution patterns and soil stoichiometry, thereby influencing carbon turnover processes and cycling rates. Drawing upon these findings, the study concludes that moderating plateau pika population density within reasonable thresholds, offers greater promise in stabilizing nutrient cycling processes in alpine meadow and upholding ecological equilibrium.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03559"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143714363","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Impact of landscape disturbance on butterfly communities: Diversity, distance dependence, and neutral model predictions","authors":"Daniel F.R. Cleary ,&nbsp;Anna M. Bijlmer ,&nbsp;Dille Wielakker ,&nbsp;Nicole J. de Voogd","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03561","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03561","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Recent theoretical work suggests that rainforest biotas are not primarily structured by environmental determinism but rather by stochastic processes. We sampled butterflies from primary and disturbed (logged, and burnt) forest landscapes and compared diversity, examined geographic distance and dissimilarity relationships, and tested for deviations from neutral model predictions. Significant distance dependence was observed in all landscapes except one. All primary forest landscapes deviated significantly from neutral model predictions; in contrast, only one of the disturbed landscapes deviated significantly. Deviation from neutrality in primary forest suggests potentially important contributions of niche specialisation and/or competitive exclusion in structuring butterfly communities. Disturbances like logging or fires, which open up the forest, seem to push these communities toward neutrality with greater species richness and evenness than proximate primary forest. Multiple disturbance events, however, appear to lead to a loss of species while maintaining relatively high evenness and communities consistent with neutral model predictions. Furthermore, the butterfly communities of once- and twice-burnt landscapes appeared to consist of species with greater tolerances to disturbance or able to rebound following disturbance in addition to species, which entered from surrounding severely degraded habitat. Interestingly, a frequently-burnt landscape, now largely devoid of forest, aligned with neutral model predictions. This landscape contained a low-richness, highly impoverished fauna consisting of widespread generalists, but with relatively high evenness. We suggest that differentially disturbed habitats act as environmental filters to butterfly species, but that neutral processes dominate after environmental filtering.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03561"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143714364","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Using global trade data to identify priorities for agarwood conservation and trade management","authors":"Kwok-wai Lai ,&nbsp;Huarong Zhang ,&nbsp;Feng Yang,&nbsp;Stephan W. Gale","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03560","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03560","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Global agarwood trade is a multibillion-dollar business, but little is known about its sustainability or conservation implications. We studied the trade using data in CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) and customs records from 2010 to 2020. We find that the trade is based mainly on endangered species sourced from the wild, with most, though not all, species that are threatened by this trade being listed in CITES. Social network analysis identified Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia as key nodes of a global agarwood trade network. Through comparisons of trade data for five agarwood trade centers, we find that CITES and customs records are consistent for Hong Kong, India, Singapore and Thailand, but that large volumes of agarwood trade from Indonesia to Africa were undocumented in CITES. We recommend increased conservation efforts to better protect threatened agarwood species in the wild and highlight specific interventions to address the impacts of the key players in this trade.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03560"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143706347","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The upper forest limit and the fate of bird assemblages in high-Andean páramo ecosystems in the Northern Andes","authors":"Jhon jairo Calderón Leyton ,&nbsp;Rubén Darío Palacio ,&nbsp;Raul Ernesto Sedano-Cruz","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03562","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03562","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The altitudinal shift of the Upper Forest Limit is a key driver of expansion and contraction cycles in high Andean páramo ecosystems above the treeline. While this historical process is well understood, its effects on páramo fragmentation—and the subsequent impact on avian richness and composition—remain poorly documented. To address this gap, we analyzed long-term bird inventories (1988–2022) across 12 páramo units and evaluated the implications of continued fragmentation as the Upper Forest Limit rises beyond 3400 m above sea level. We framed our analysis within a historical model that reconstructs the most likely Upper Forest Limit shifts over the past 20000 years in the Nariño-Putumayo Páramo District of southwestern Colombia. Our findings suggest that the progressive contraction and fragmentation of páramo habitats—driven by Upper Forest Limit shifts—may significantly influence local bird assemblages, leading to shifts in species richness and composition. Smaller and more isolated páramo units in the Nariño-Putumayo Páramo District could develop avian communities shaped by nestedness patterns, possible species replacement, and local extirpation. Since the rise or fall of the Upper Forest Limit is directly driven by temperature changes, climate change will significantly impact the vulnerability of species dependent on the páramo.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03562"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143725700","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The influence of grazing intensity and wetland availability on breeding shorebird populations in a Eurasian steppe","authors":"Tamás Zalai ,&nbsp;Sándor Borza ,&nbsp;Balázs András Lukács ,&nbsp;Zsolt Végvári","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03557","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03557","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Traditional grazing has a long history on the steppes of Eurasia, dating back to as early as the Late Stone Age, which has contributed to present landscape composition and habitat topology. However, the number of livestock grazing in the steppes has significantly reduced during the past four decades. This exerted multiple detrimental effects in protected areas, by accelerating succession processes and leading to the declining quality of natural grassland habitats. This might have contributed to the global decline of shorebird populations that led even to local extinctions in a number of species. Here we aimed to investigate relationships among attributes of grazing and breeding population of shorebirds applying standardised surveys at ten sample sites in Hortobágy, the largest interconnected alkali steppe of Europe. We found that grazing pressure showed positive relationships with population sizes of nearly all shorebirds species. The number of breeding pairs increased with the density of grazing livestock. While only 15 % of waders bred in areas with less than 1,0 grazing unit/ha, this ratio amounted to 71 % in areas exceeding 1,5 grazing unit/ha. In several species, we found positive relationships between the number of breeding pairs and the size of open water surface. 81 % of breeding populations bred in sample sites where the extent of open water exceeded 10 ha. These findings support the hypothesis that grazing is a key driver of breeding in shorebirds in grassland ecosystems.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03557"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143747428","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Seabird moult timing and duration: Implications for at-sea threat exposure worldwide","authors":"Peter Allen ,&nbsp;Anne Peters,&nbsp;Zali Stiefel,&nbsp;Rohan H. Clarke","doi":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03558","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.gecco.2025.e03558","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Tubenosed seabirds (order procellariforms) are the most threatened bird group. Threats generally act on two distinct elements of their life-history, either breeding at terrestrial colonies, or during the nonbreeding season while at sea foraging and migrating. Moult is often overlooked as another critical life-history component that can determine their vulnerability and exposure to threats at sea. Using 13,092 geo-referenced citizen-science photographs from publicly available and private collections, we scored primary feather moult for 6 gadfly petrel species (<em>Pterodroma</em> spp.) as a representative and understudied group of tubenosed seabirds. To investigate environmental conditions of areas where gadfly petrels moult, we quantified moult phenology for 1336 individuals. Moult activity overlapped with breeding and/or migration in all species, a surprising result, as these processes are temporally offset in many other birds. Sea surface temperature predicted moult activity in most species, with the probability of active moult being greater in areas with higher sea surface temperatures. Higher sea surface temperatures are associated with lower marine productivity, so gadfly petrels undergo moult in less productive waters than they occupy at other times. This possibly reflects avoidance of adverse conditions that disproportionately affect gadfly petrels with compromised plumage. Our findings indicate that moult is important for understanding tubenosed seabird distributions, and affects exposure to substantial threats. Knowledge of how moult informs threat exposure can refine best-practice in conservation planning for seabirds, by informing key management tools such as designating marine protected areas.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":54264,"journal":{"name":"Global Ecology and Conservation","volume":"59 ","pages":"Article e03558"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143706346","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}