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 (04-16-2018, 11:46 PM)Tshokwane Wrote: A biologist believes that trees speak a language we can learn: If they're speaking amongst themselves, I hope they're conspiring. 
When forests are not forests at all, can fire be used to better manage them?
*This image is copyright of its original author Banner image: Sambar deer ((s) another one behind) in a freshly burnt patch in the Panna National Park. Photo by Abi Vanak.
The grassy forests of Bandipur, however, like many dry deciduous “forests” in south India, are not forests at all. The trees here are adapted to fire and the dry grasses fuel it frequently in the dry months between monsoons. These ecosystems are more open than closed canopy forests and the hardy vegetation found here can withstand drought conditions. Majestic teak (Tectona grandis) and Arjuna (Terminalia arjuna) trees dominate the skyline and these natural ecosystems support a wide variety of birds, mammals, reptiles and invertebrates, contrary to the belief that they are wastelands or degraded forests  (forest is not equal to wildlife or conservation, forest+grasslands+savanna+swamps etc.., all together is CONSERVATION).Jayashree Ratnam, associate director of the wildlife biology and conservation programme at the National Centre for Biological Science, said that these forests are mesic savannas. “Having worked for a while in African savannas and being very familiar with the idea that mixed tree-grass ecosystems were distinctive from forests, when we returned to India and started visiting various field sites, we were struck by the similarities of these sites with African savannas,” she said. Mesic savannas receive more rainfall than some other iconic savannas of the tropics, but such ecosystems the world over are characterised by frequent burning and drought. India, however, has a blanket fire-suppression policy in place and this is doing more harm than good to these tree-grass ecosystems, find a series of studies.  *This image is copyright of its original author Grass dominated understory, in a mesic woodland savanna, Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary. Photo by Ed February. “The more we worked and documented, the more we realised that viewing these ecosystems as forests resulted in a fundamental misunderstanding of their functional ecology, especially the roles of fire and herbivores in maintaining these ecosystems,” added Ratnam. An ecosystem that evolved with fire Savannas are ecosystems having a continuous layer of grass along with a discontinuous tree canopy. However, this structural definition of a savanna doesn’t take into consideration other biological traits of individuals and communities, which provide clues about the evolution and functional ecology of this ecosystem. For instance, studies show that tropical savannas are almost always trees interspersed with grass of the C4 kind. C4 photosynthetic plants lose as little water as possible and are adapted to live in hot and dry environments. The C4 grasses in Indian savannas are subsequently highly tolerant of fire, but shade intolerant. They also prove to be highly flammable in the dry season and readily promote fires. Such fires create open environments with little shade and both grasses and savanna trees that are intolerant of shade depend on this fire to grow. Quote:Savanna trees have a number of adaptations to live in a fire-driven ecosystem. Their large underground storage organs and roots contain much of their resources and fire cannot damage these stores. Saplings re-sprout quickly and grow rapidly. Adult trees have less dense canopies than forest species, allowing more sunlight to permeate to the ground level. Mature trees also have thick bark. A 2019 study found that on average, savanna tree species from peninsular India produced twice as much bark as evergreen forest trees. The researchers compared traits of trees from areas classified as dry deciduous forests and evergreen forests, in order to see how savanna species differed from forest species.  *This image is copyright of its original author Typical semi-arid to mesic woodland savanna in summer, at Panna National Park. Photo by Abi Vanak.“The evergreen forests provide a contrast from approximately the same geographic region as the savannas, which is relevant when making traits-based comparisons and inferences,” explained Anand M. Osuri, a co-author of the paper. These leaf- and stem-based comparisons that the researchers made, helped them make their case that the dry deciduous forests were, in fact, savannas. Traditional burning practices and current spread of Lantana Historically, indigenous people in India used controlled burning as a way to manage their forests. The Soligas of Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple Wildlife Sanctuary, for example, would set fires early in the summer for a wide variety of reasons. Ground fires, they believe, kept hemiparasites at bay, and now, adult trees are falling prey to these organisms that depend on them in part for their survival. Soligas find that the invasive Lantana has spread, to the detriment of understorey plants and altering the structure of the forest significantly in the process. This spread of Lantana can have detrimental effects across trophic levels. “Allowing for periodic fires creates a mosaic of different densities of woody vegetation and also prevents the dominance of some weedy species such as Lantana camara. What we see now in most peninsular Indian “forests” is that fire has been totally banned and as a result Lantana has completely taken over the understorey. Since few herbivores eat the leaves of Lantana, this is going to reduce ungulate density and therefore negatively affect large carnivores such as the tiger,” said Abi T. Vanak, an associate professor with the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment.  *This image is copyright of its original author Heavily Lantana dominated understory in the BRT tiger reserve. Photo by Abi Vanak.Ban on fire A 2017 article notes that the absolute ban on using fire to manage these “forests” comes from colonial-era forest policy. In the 1800s, the Imperial Forest Service declared that all forest fires were harmful and that they should be prevented, disregarding pre-existing traditional practices of periodic burning to manage the land. The European foresters had learned that fire was harmful for silvicultural activities, and applied the same knowledge to Indian forests which were, after all, viewed as a timber resource. But the foresters were not able to ignore the negative effects of their no-fire policy forever. In the 1930s, amid reports of disease spread, decreasing soil fertility, weeds and pests and massive uncontrolled wildfires, they were forced to allow burning in some forests. By then, the damage was done and controlled burning, learned over 50,000 years, would never be practiced the same way again in the subcontinent. Why correct classification matters In peninsular India, all areas with some amount of tree cover have been classified as forests in the past. Open mesic savannas have not been differentiated from deciduous forests since early British foresters saw the ecosystem’s value purely on the basis of timber resources. The grasslands were forgotten, despite harbouring rich biodiversity. “Savannas are iconic ecosystems and are readily recognisable. Unfortunately, association is always with African savannas. Quote:We need to recognise that several species in India have also evolved in the semi-arid savanna region, including the great Indian bustard, blackbuck, chinkara, Lion and Indian wolf ("not to mention the cheetah"). However, if we look more closely, we see that even tigers, cheetal, sambar, gaur and elephants occur at their highest densities in mesic savanna habitats (the so-called dry deciduous forests) or in disturbance-maintained grasslands within more forested landscapes. Take for example the meadows of Kanha, the chaurs of Corbett, or the grassy swamp ‘hadlus’ of Nagarahole,” points out Vanak. Ratnam said that urgent research is needed to understand how the spread of Lantana and suppression of fire have altered fire dynamics in the region. Vanak adds that the Bandipur fire was caused by poor understanding of savanna ecology, with fire suppression and Lantana proliferation contributing to a massive build-up of fuel load. “Instead of having periodic “cool” or grass fires, which burn fast and at a much lower temperature, we instead have these massive conflagrations that end up reaching the canopy and killing trees. The consequence of the narrative that all fire is bad and “destroys” forests is ironically now creating the most damage. Nonetheless, these are resilient systems, and after just one monsoon, you’ll see a dramatic change – with grass replacing Lantana, and surviving trees in full leaf. Given that we are going to be faced with hotter summers and drier years, this business as usual attitude will no longer work. The only way we can stop these fire storms, is by regular cool season burning, which is something that the forest department in fact used to do earlier”, he signs off.  *This image is copyright of its original author The Nagarjunsagar-Srisailam Tiger Reserve  . Photo by Swapna Nelaballi.CITATION: Ratnam, J., Bond, W. J., Fensham, R. J., Hoffmann, W. A., Archibald, S., Lehmann, C. E., … & Sankaran, M. (2011). When is a ‘forest’ a savanna, and why does it matter?. Global Ecology and Biogeography, 20(5), 653-660. Ratnam, J., Chengappa, S. K., Machado, S. J., Nataraj, N., Osuri, A. M., & Sankaran, M. (2019). Functional traits of trees from dry deciduous ‘forests’ of southern India suggest seasonal drought and fire are important drivers. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 7:8. Thekaekara, T., Vanak, A. T., Hiremath, A. J., Rai, N. D., Ratnam, J., & Sukumar, R. (2017). Notes from the other side of a forest fire. Economic & Political Weekly, 52(25), 22-25. 
Spurt in tiger sightings at Dudhwa Tiger Reserve
Priyangi Agarwal | TOI | March, 2020 Experts said luck too matters in sighting of tigers but tourists should look forward to enjoying the ecosystem rather than focusing only on tigers.  *This image is copyright of its original author BAREILLY: A visit to Dudhwa Tiger Reserve (DTR) this year is proving to be a memorable trip for tourists as there has been a spurt in tiger sightings. Forest officials say at least one batch of tourists manages to spot a tiger every day. DTR boasts of nearly 100 tigers but these shy felines were rarely seen in the past. Field director, DTR, Sanjay Pathak told, “Tigers are being sighted almost every day across the reserve either in the morning or evening shifts. The tiger sightings have increased here in comparison to three years ago.” Giving reasons behind the rise in tiger sightings in DTR, Pathak said, “From December, we start grassland management and a large number of herbivores came out to consume fresh grass. Tigers too followed as they prey on herbivores. The tourists did not spot the big cats on days when it rained last month but as the weather has become clear, tigers are coming out to bask in the sun. Even in summer, herbivores come near water bodies to drink and the big cats lie in wait there to capture them.” Fazlur Rahman, wildlife photographer who spends much time in the forest and has sighted tigers a few times over the past two months, said, “Better management by Dudhwa authorities and good population of tigers are the reasons why tourists are spotting tigers here.”  *This image is copyright of its original author According to forest officials, UP governor Anandiben Patel who visited DTR in the first week of this month was able to “catch a glimpse of a tiger”. However, her family members “sighted a big cat”, they said. In November last year, a few tourists who visited the reserve spotted a tigress along with its five cubs. However, for the protection of tigress and cubs, forest authorities have restricted movement of tourists on routes near its location. A tigress can become very aggressive in order to protect its cubs. Experts said luck too matters in sighting of tigers but tourists should look forward to enjoying the ecosystem, lest go home unsatisfied. Leeladhar Sonu, a guide at Dudhwa, said, “It is a good sign that there has been increase in tiger sightings but the big cats are not the only the highlight of Dudhwa. Apart from tigers, tourists can spot rhinos, elephants, migratory birds and five types of deer.” Forest officials, nearly 40,000 to 50,000 tourists visit DTR every year and they are expecting the same number this time.
Gaur back in Valmiki Reserve thanks to increase in grassland cover
At least 150 gaur in the reserve currently, according to information from camera traps Mohd Imran Khan Monday 9th March 2020  *This image is copyright of its original author Gaur (Bos Gaurus), listed as ‘vulnerable’ on the IUCN’s Red List 1986 & the largest extant bovine in the world, have not only returned to Bihar’s Valmiki Tiger Reserve (VTR), but are also breeding there due to an increase in grassland cover, officials have said.A large numbers of gaur had been spotted in camera traps — a sign of improving biodiversity and a positive development for VTR, field director Hemkant Roy told Down To Earth on March 9, 2020. “Gaur have been attracted to VTR due to the increase in grassland cover. Gaur are grassland specialists and their main food is grass,” Roy said. He added that there were more than 150 gaur including calves, in VTR currently. “We will try and bring further improvement to the habitat so that these animals add to biodiversity,” he said. VTR was set up in the early 1990s. It is spread over 899 km² in Bihar’s West Champaran district, bordering Nepal’s Chitwan National Park to its north and Uttar Pradesh to its west. Gaur, which are native to south and southeast Asia, had shifted to Chitwan a few years back due to grassland destruction in VTR. But in the last one decade, VTR had increased its grassland cover to 15% from 4% by reclaiming degraded scrublands & had created 22 water holes to provide easy sources of water for wild animals within the reserve area, according to Roy. “Increasing grasslands in VTR is a right step for tiger conservation,” Santosh Tiwari, director of ecology at Bihar’s Department of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, said. Herbivores, which big cats such as tigers prey on, depend on such grassland. An increase in their cover thus helps in supporting the prey population, in turn increasing the chances of the carnivores’ survival. The increase in grassland will arguably provide a better environment for the tigers — VTR had more than 40 of them including atleast 9 cubs by last internal count. It is up from 8 in 2010. 
Animals large and small once covered North America’s prairies – and in some places, they could again
19Feb, 2020 By Joel Berger Editor’s note: Joel Berger, Barbara Cox Anthony Chair in Wildlife Conservation at Colorado State University, and Jon Beckmann, adjunct faculty at University of Nevada, Reno, wrote this piece for The Conversation in February 2020. Colorado State is a contributing institution to The Conversation, an independent collaboration between editors and academics that provides informed news analysis and commentary to the general public. See the entire list of contributing faculty and their articles here.  *This image is copyright of its original author Bighorn sheep on grassland in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. Joel Berger, CC BY-NDIn the grip of winter, the North American prairies can look deceptively barren. But many wild animals have evolved through harsh winters on these open grasslands, foraging in the snow and sheltering in dens from cold temperatures and biting winds. Today most of our nation’s prairies are covered with the amber waves of grain that Katharine Lee Bates lauded in “America the Beautiful,” written in 1895. But scientists know surprisingly little about today’s remnant biodiversity in the grasslands – especially the status of what we call “big small mammals,” such as badgers, foxes, jackrabbits and porcupines. Land conservation in the heartland has been underwhelming. According to most estimates, less than 4% of the tallgrass prairie ecosystem that once covered some 170 million acres of North America is left. And when native grasslands are altered, populations of endemic species like prairie dogs shrink dramatically. Together, we have more than 60 years of experience using field-based, hypothesis-driven science to conserve wildlife in grassland systems in North America and across the globe. We have studied and protected species ranging from pronghornand bison in North America to saiga and wild yak in Central Asia. If scientists can identify what has been lost and retained here in the U.S., farmers, ranchers and communities can make more informed choices about managing their lands and the species that depend upon them.  *This image is copyright of its original author Major types of North American grasslands. Karen Launchbaugh/Wikimedia CommonsTwo harsh centuries of settlement North America’s prairies stretch north from Mexico into Canada, and from the Mississippi River west to the Rocky Mountains. Grasslands also exist in areas farther west, between the Rockies and Pacific coastal ranges. When Thomas Jefferson approved the Lewis and Clark Expedition in 1803, this territory was home to Native Americans and abundant wildlife. Vast, unbroken horizons of contiguous grasslands supported millions of prairie dogs, pronghorn, bison and elk, and thousands of bighorn sheep. Birds were also numerous, including greater prairie-chickens, multiple types of grouse and more than 3 billion passenger pigeons. Lewis and Clark kept detailed records of the plants and animals they encounteredon their three-year journey. Their journals describe grizzly bears and wolves, black-footed ferrets and burrowing owls, sage grouse and prairie chickens. Sources like this and John James Audubon’s “Birds of America,” published between 1827 and 1838, confirm that before European settlement, North America’s prairies teemed with wildlife.  *This image is copyright of its original author Pronghorn, which Lewis and Clark called ‘speed goats,’ under the shadow of Wyoming’s Wind River Range.Joel Berger, CC BY-ND That changed as European immigrants moved west over the next hundred years. Market hunting was one cause, but settlers also tilled and poisoned, fertilized and fenced the land, drained aquifers and damaged soils. As humans altered the prairies, bison disappeared from 99% of their native range. Prairie dogs, black-footed ferrets, wolves and grizzly bears followed the same sad course. In the mid-20th century, conservationists began fighting to protect and restore what remained. It isn’t surprising that wildlife agencies and conservation organizations focused on targets that were big, famous and economically important: Birds for hunting, deer for dinner and fisheries for food and sport. Some efforts succeeded. Montana has retained every species that Lewis and Clark observed there. In 2016 Congress passed legislation declaring bison the U.S. national mammal, following various restoration initiatives in places such as the Wichita Mountains of Oklahoma and the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in the Flint Hills of Kansas. Pronghorn antelope, which Lewis and Clark called “speed goats,” have rebounded from fewer than 20,000 in the early 20th century to some 700,000 today, ranging across grasslands from northern Mexico and Texas to North Dakota, Montana and southern Canada But elk remain rare on the grassy savannas, as do prairie dogs and wild bison. North American grassland birds – larks and pipits, curlews and mountain plovers – are in decline or serious collapse. Introduction of nonnative exotic fish, reduced water flows in prairie rivers and streams due to agriculture, and declines in water quality and quantity have decimated native fish species and aquatic invertebrates, such as freshwater mussels, in the waterways of grassland ecosystems. Where the animals still roam In contrast to North America, other regions still have large intact grasslands with functional ecosystems. White-tailed gazelles and khulan (Asiatic wild ass) still move hundreds of miles across the vast unfenced steppes of Mongolia. White-eared kob, a sub-Saharan antelope, travel hundreds of miles every year across a North Dakota-sized swath of southern Sudan in one of Africa’s longest land migrations. Chiru (antelope) and kiang (large wild asses) maintain their historical movements across the vast Tibetan plateau. Even war-torn Afghanistan has designated two national parks to ensure that snow leopards, wolves and ibex can continue to roam. Some parts of the North American prairies could support this kind of biodiversity again. The Flint Hills of Kansas and Oklahoma, Nebraska’s Sandhills and Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front all retain areas that have never been plowed, ranging from 1 million to 4 million acres. Public agencies and nonprofit conservation groups are already working in these areas to promote conservation and support grassland ecosystems. Knowledge gaps impede conservation Conserving native species on American grasslands has moved slowly because this region has been so compromised by land conversion for farming and development. What’s more, despite technological innovations and powerful analytical tools, scientists don’t have realistic estimates today of abundance or population trends for most vertebrate species, whether they are mammal, bird or fish.  *This image is copyright of its original author White-tailed jackrabbit in Wyoming. Joel Berger, CC BY-NDMeasuring remnant diversity is a first step toward deciding what to prioritize for protection. One way we’re doing this is by posing simple questions to families who’ve lived out on these lands for multiple generations. One Montana rancher told us the last porcupine he saw was – well, he couldn’t remember, but they used to occur. Another, in Wyoming, said it had been perhaps two decades since he had last seen white-tailed jackrabbits, a species once common there. From Colorado to New Mexico and the Dakotas to Utah, responses are similar. Across the region, the status of species like foxes, porcupines, white-tailed jack rabbits, beavers, badgers and marmots is punctuated by question marks. Continent-wide trends remain a mystery. The good news is that national parks have inventory and monitoring programs that make it possible to assess trends more comprehensively for some of these species. Citizen scientists are helping by reporting occurrences of species such as black-tailed jackrabbits. As scientists delve further into databases, patterns of species retention or loss should become clearer. For example, our work on white-tailed jack rabbits revealed that decades ago they were abundant in the valleys in and around the Tetons of northwest Wyoming and spanned Yellowstone National Park’s northern range. However, by the year 2000 they were absent from the Tetons and occupied only a small area of Yellowstone. The U.S. has a history of protecting its majestic mountains and deserts. But in our view, it has undervalued its biologically rich grasslands. With more support for conservation on the prairies, wildlife of all sizes – big and small – could again thrive on America’s fruited plains.
Nature Needs Half
FUTURE PLANET Scientists and conservationists are proposing that up to half of Earth’s land and oceans be protected for nature. Is it a necessary step or a pipe dream? By Jim Robbins, BBC Future 19th March 2020 A map showing biodiversity intactness in 2015, with darker colors indicating more intact ecological community composition. HILL ET AL. 2018 / IPBES  *This image is copyright of its original author As humans continue to rapidly expand the scope of their domination of nature – bulldozing and burning down forests and other natural areas, wiping out species, and breaking down ecosystem functions – a growing number of influential scientists and conservationists think that protecting half of the planet in some form is going to be key to keeping it habitable.
The idea first received public attention in 2016 when E.O. Wilson, the legendary 90-year-old conservation biologist, published the idea in his book Half Earth: Our Planet’s Fight for Life. “We now have enough measurements of extinction rates and the likely rate in the future to know that it is approaching a thousand times the baseline of what existed before humanity came along,” he told The New York Times in a 2016 interview. Once thought of as aspirational, many are now taking these ideas seriously, not only as a firewall to protect biodiversity, but also to mitigate continued climate warming. Reserving large swathes of land can help to stabilise vital ecosystems, such as rainforests, that act as carbon sink.  *This image is copyright of its original author One of the major reasons for adoption of these extreme preservation goals is a 2019 report by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), which found that more than 1 million species are at risk of extinction. Conducted by hundreds of researchers around the world, the study is considered the most comprehensive analysis of the state of the world’s biodiversity ever. That report concluded that it’s not only species that are at risk, however. The myriad life-support functions that these species and ecosystems provide also are threatened — everything from clean water and air to flood control and climate regulation, food and a host of other services. Moreover, some scientists are concerned that the face of the globe has been so altered that the global ecosystem could be near a tipping point that would disrupt the climate and biological systems that sustain life and cause widespread – and perhaps disastrous – environmental instability. The ambitious goal of protecting and restoring natural systems on a large scale is shared by a number of groups and people. The Wyss Campaign for Nature is working in partnership with the National Geographic Society to support the goals of the so-called “30x30” movement, a highly ambitious initiative that aims to protect 30% of the planet, on land and at sea, by 2030. Another organisation called Nature Needs Half has drawn in scientists and conservation groups – including the Sierra Club and the International Union for Conservation of Nature – that are pressing for the protection of 50% of the planet by 2030. The European Parliament has pledged to protect 30% of European Union territory, restore degraded ecosystems, add biodiversity objectives into all EU policies, and earmark 10% of the budget for improvement of biodiversity. In the US, politicians working with conservation organisations recently introduced a resolution to drum up support for protection of 30% of the US’s land and marine areas. Quote:The US alone loses a football field of nature every 30 seconds All eyes are now on the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), a multilateral treaty created by the United Nations to write a 10-year biodiversity plan. The 2010 CBD meeting called for 17% of the terrestrial planet to be protected in some form and 10% of the oceans by 2020. That goal was not reached – currently about 16% of the terrestrial planet has been protected, and less than 8% of marine ecosystems. So reaching the 2030 goal would require a near doubling of land protections and a quadrupling of ocean protections – all in the next decade. It’s a daunting challenge, even if the will is there, with some countries – notably Brazil and the US – moving in the opposite direction. Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has opened up the Amazon rainforest to an onslaught of land-clearing, logging and agricultural development. And last year the Trump Administration eliminated the Landscape Conservation Cooperative Network, an Obama-era program that created 22 research centres to tackle landscape-level conservation problems across the US. The Trump administration also is either opening up, or proposing to open up, large areas of protected federal lands to oil and gas drilling and other resource exploitation, including the vast Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. Upholding the rights of Indigenous people is crucial to issue of protecting some of the world's most biodiverse habitats, such as the Brazilian Amazon.  *This image is copyright of its original author It’s estimated that the US alone loses a football field of nature every 30 seconds. Far more natural lands are being lost in the Brazilian Amazon, with more than 10 square miles of rainforest being burned or cleared every day. Still, there is optimism. Reports of large-scale climate changes, including the melting of Arctic sea ice, as well as the attention focused on 17-year-old Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, seem to have stirred some kind of awakening. “Younger people in general are focusing on environmental issues,” said Brian O’Donnell, director of the Campaign for Nature. “And we are seeing much less of a siloed approach, where those who work on climate and those who work on conservation are working together more.” Some countries are already moving toward ambitious goals. In Canada, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has committed the country to the Pathway to Canada Target 1 initiative, which aims to reach the 30x30 goals. (At the same time, Trudeau has committed the federal government to building the Trans Mountain pipeline to carry Alberta tar sands oil to Pacific ports, a move that has drawn fierce criticism from First Nations leaders and environmentalists.) Costa Rica, Colombia and others are also ramping up conservation efforts. Quote:This is not just about saving species, it’s about maintaining ecological processes that underpin all life on Earth – Gary Tabor The ambitious goals of campaigns like 30x30 and Half Earth have been met with criticism. Some question whether focusing on saving up to half of the land’s surface will do much for protecting the remaining biodiversity. In a 2018 paper, Stuart Pimm, a conservation biologist at Duke University, and others, argued that most biodiversity occurs in tropical regions, and much of it is already fragmented. They wrote how protecting broad swaths of nature in largely untouched regions – such as Canada’s boreal forest – has benefits. But the remaining large wild landscapes are mostly in temperate regions, which won’t do much for protecting biodiversity because by far most of the world’s species are in the tropics. “This begs our question of how much biodiversity will we protect if the trend to protect wild places continues,” says Pimm. In a paper published last year in Nature Sustainability, a team of researchers argued that protecting vast swaths of the Earth could, conservatively, affect 1 billion people and in some cases increase poverty. “Social issues must play a more prominent role if we want to deliver effective conservation that works for both the biosphere and the people who inhabit it,” said Judith Schleicher, a University of Cambridge researcher who led the study. While conservation has tremendous positive aspects, she said, “certain forms of ‘fortress’ conservation can see people displaced from their ancestral home and denied access to resources they rely on for their survival.” Some dispute that argument. “When IPBES came out it said 1 million species are at risk,” said Gary Tabor, president of the Center for Large Landscape Conservation in Bozeman, Montana. “But this is not just about saving species, it’s about maintaining ecological processes that underpin all life on Earth. It’s 1 million species interacting with each other that clean your water, give you good soil, that scrub the air of CO2 – that’s what you lose.” Disease prevention, for example, is a major ecosystem service of intact natural systems. As people clear wild lands or eat wild animals, the diseases that these creatures carry can jump the species barrier and spill over into human societies. The ongoing coronavirus outbreak, for example, may have originated in bats. Finding ways for people to live inside nature reserves, rather than trying to keep people out with walls, can help preserve biodiverse habitats overall.  *This image is copyright of its original author Nature must also be integrated into the places where people live, says Tabor. “The biggest misconception about Half Earth is that there is going to be a bizarre construction where people live on one side and nature lives on the other,” he said. “That doesn’t work in terms of ecological function, and it doesn’t work because there is conservation value outside of protected areas.” Conservationists also say that a major part of reaching the 30 or 50% goals is supporting indigenous lands and community conservation areas. Indigenous peoples occupy or manage 28% of the planet’s land, but more than 40% of protected areas, according to the IPBES report, co-chaired by Sandra Díaz, a professor of ecology at the National University of Córdoba in Argentina. What are the biggest barriers to setting aside 30%, and perhaps 50%, of the planet for nature, even as the global population continues to grow rapidly? “The way our world agricultural system works,” said O’Donnell of the Wyss Campaign for Nature. “It encourages lots of encroaching on more and more land for cattle and farming. That’s a key one.” Quote:The number of paved roads is expected to double in the next 25 years, opening up large areas to illegal resource exploitation, poaching, and other threats The Wyss Campaign for Nature is prioritising solutions for financing protection. “We’re studying the cost of protection and also looking at what would be the cost if you didn’t protect this amount of land, in terms of lost ecosystem services, clean waters, and fisheries,” said O’Donnell. “There’s a cost of conserving land, and a cost if we don’t.” And setting aside lands for protection is by no means the end of the story. The Campaign for Nature is studying possible sources of funding so countries can pay for the cost of managing and protecting these lands. Among the many threats facing large tracts of land, including those ostensibly under protection, are road building and fragmentation. The number of paved roads is expected to double in the next 25 years, opening up large areas to illegal resource exploitation, poaching, and other threats, says Tabor. “People will go first to the boreal [forest] or Central Africa,” for protecting large tracts of nature, says Tabor. “But most of where the biodiversity exists is in fragmented areas. To have effective nature in those areas we will have to have a connectivity strategy.” O’Donnell agrees that there are huge challenges. “Just as the climate crisis requires major systematic change in the coming decades, it’s the same with biodiversity,” he says. “There are a lot of other things competing for money and attention.” Article was originally published by Yale Environment 360.
Gotta mention the recent drastic changes in Venice (some of the popular photos/videos are from adjoining areas though) here! Coronavirus lockdown has transformed La Serenissima’s waterways & coastal waters.
The apparent cleanliness of the water is not in fact due to a lack of pollution, but the reason is the absence of motorised transport, which normally churns up the muddy canal floor. With the water-traffic halted & tourists gone, the canals got a clear view of the sandy bed, but shoals of tiny fish, scuttling crabs and multicoloured plant-life.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Birds like cormorants & ducks, have returned to dive for fish they can now see.  *This image is copyright of its original author As its common with social media, some claims are over the top though. Swans were already regular visitors in canals of Burano, an island in the bay of Venice. Marine wildlife, like dolphins, would sometimes enter the bay, but the supposedly recent video was actually filmed last year.  *This image is copyright of its original author The Venice lagoon is a fragile ecosystem... If possible then after this crisis blows over, they should keep some parts off limits.
Applied nucleation facilitates tropical forest recovery: Lessons learned from a 15‐year study
Abstract ENTHIS LINK GOES TO A ENGLISH SECTIONESTHIS LINK GOES TO A SPANISH SECTION
[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.8)]Miyawaki Way to Green Urban Landscapes & Degraded Forests[/color]
This radical method of raising diverse forests can be a boon to tackle the challenges of climate change and lack of green cover across various locations. Mohan Chandra Pargaien  *This image is copyright of its original author Miyawaki forests give faster, denser, more biodiverse & multilayered foliage than conventional afforestation methods.  *This image is copyright of its original author One of the fantastic gifts of Mother Nature, trees are vital and valuable resources for the survival of mankind apart from providing umpteen goods and services. The role of trees in mitigating climate change especially in capturing and sequestering carbon has made them a favourite to address the climate change-related challenges including deforestation. The importance of forests and initiatives to raise tree planting have of late started gaining momentum both at global and national levels. Recently launched “One Trillion Trees” Initiative of World Economic Forum with UNEP and FAO or the “Bonn Challenge” of Germany and IUCN or “Plant a Billion Trees” of Nature Conservancy’s or “Billion Trees Tsunami” of Pakistan, the efforts across the globe are intensified aiming to increase the tree cover both for the restoration of degraded forests and to increase the carbon sequestering capacity. The Indian Government under the Paris Climate Agreement has also pledged to increase its forests by 95 million hectares by 2030. Apart from its regular tree programmes, states governments have also initiated tree planting programmes of various magnitudes. Uttar Pradesh’s 220 million trees planting during 2019 and Madhya Pradesh’s 66 million tree planting in one dayduring 2017 are a few such programmes. The newly created state of Telangana also launched a prestigious Flagship programme “Haritha Haram” (green garland) programmes in 2015 with a target of planting 100 crores inside forests and 130 trees outside forests and so far 180 crore seedlings have been planted. The tree planting has primarily been a subject matter of forestry professionals due to involvement of technical inputs starting from raising seedlings to maintaining of plantations for various purposes; however, various organizations/NGOs and individuals have also been taking up tree planting with modifications suiting local needs. One such method to raise plantation that has gained momentum recently is the Miyawaki Method. Named after Dr. Akira Miyawaki, noted botanist and conservationist of Japan, this method aims at restoring and creating indigenous forests. The concept of Potential Natural Vegetation (PNV) developed by Reinhold Tüxen in 1956, which refers to vegetation that has been established naturally under existing environmental conditions except human interference, is an underlying principle of this method. Since native species are only suited and qualified to form such vegetation, Dr. Miyawaki strongly advocated the use of native species to restore the degraded forests along with a variety of accompanying species (supporting species). He succeeded in restoring various kinds of forests that have been degraded due to different reasons across Japan and other tropical countries and is credited for planting around 40 million trees at 1700 locations across the world. Miyawaki method, in other words, is planting native species or facilitating the regeneration of native species. This method is claimed to get 10 times more fast growth, 30 times more density, and 100 times more biodiversity than conventional plantations. Quote:“The most important thing to do right now is to build native forests which survive thousands of years until the next glacial age arrives.”  *This image is copyright of its original author Also called “Potted seedling method”, the main components of this method are seed collection of native and companion species, growing them in bags or pots, preparation of soils, use of mulching and soil enhancers followed by planting and maintenance up to 3 years then leaving it to nature on the concept that “no management is the best management”. Random planting of native species at very close spacing facilitates to recreate the complexity of natural forests by allowing young regeneration to grow faster. The result after a few years is the creation of multi-canopied forests. As the forests created under this method are naturally layered and are composed of native plant communities supporting each other, these forests are also called “Native forest scapes”. Gaining popularity: Over the last few years, Miyawaki method has gained overwhelming response in India. “Afforest” a for-profit social enterprise with its founder Mr. Subhendu Sharma is credited for starting this technique in India in August 2011. This was followed by other voluntary organizations like “Saytrees”, “Sankalptaru”, PSUs like NTPC, IOC, various State forest departments, Indian Navy and individuals adopting this method across various parts of India in varying extent. A recently approved proposal of Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to plant 377,416 trees at a cost of ₹350 million and Gautam Budh Nagar’s plan to cover 71,000 sq metres land in Greater Noida with 0.2 million plants in collaboration with Samsung to develop the biggest and dense Miyawaki forest in India are also noteworthy and indicates its growing popularity. Excellent growth of the plantations raised so far under this method is highly encouraging and motivating other organizations/corporations and even government departments to examine its replicability along with regular programmes. 10 months old saplings of Miyawaki Plantation Haryana India.  *This image is copyright of its original author Proven results: There have been a few research findings worldwide endorsing the efficacy of this method. An 11-year study conducted by Schirone, B., Salis, A., & Vessella, F conducted in the forests of Sadinina where previous attempts of reforestation method failed found the positive impact of Miyawaki method as reflected in better survival of plants as compared to the previous failure of the traditional method, improved density and growth without maintenance.[ In another study conducted to determine the effect of Miyawaki method on soil quality and understory vegetation in Nanhai District of China by X. F. Guo found the Miyawaki method is better for preserving soil quality, its fertility apart from accumulating good average coverage, and biomass of shrubs and herbaceous layers in different afforestation lands when compared to the traditional method. Cost of Raising: One of the widely discussed and debatable issues relating to Miyawaki forest is its higher cost of raising and maintenance due to adoption of close spacing, enrichment of soil and regular watering and other maintenance. Compared to traditional planting where plant-to-plant distance ranges from 2.5 meters to 4 meters, spacing under Miyawaki ranges from 50 cm to 100 cm. So, in case you have a 100 square meter plot for Miyawaki at 50 cm spacing you need 441 plants while the same plot in traditional planting adopting 3 meters spacing (normally adopted) will require 16 plants only. The difference in spacing thereby makes the cost of raising as high as up to ₹700 per square Met against approximately ₹ 200 per square met in the traditional method of planting. One of the alternatives to tackle degraded forests: As per recent FAO’s State of the World’s Forests report 2020, “Since 1990, it is estimated that 420 million hectares of forest have been lost through conversion to other land uses, although the rate of deforestation has decreased over the past three decades.” As per Forest Survey of India report 2019, India is having 3,04,499,00 Hac (30 million ) of forest land as open forest (having density between 10 % to 40%) accounting for 9.26 % of geographical area and considerable areas under this category are degraded and available for planting including rejuvenation. India has recently planned to restore 26 million hectares (MH) from its land degradation status up to 2030 out of which 21 MHA (about 81%) is forest land, and 5 MHA lies outside forests. However various programmes aiming at the restoration of degraded lands both at national and international levels have not fully succeeded to achieve the desired goals in the absence of necessary wherewithal like policy support, financial backup, and institutionalisation. The attempts to tackle degraded lands in the past like that of China’s ‘Great Green Wall to plant nearly 90 million acres of new forest reported to have a failure to the extent of 85 per cent of the plantings. Similarly most of the 11m trees planted in Turkish project reported to be dead either due to being planted at the wrong time and not by the expert, as well as a lack of rainfall. Since forestry species usually take longer time to grow and establish, tackling such huge tracks of degraded lands not only requires sound policy initiatives and financial linkages but also the adoption of innovative and fast-responding interventions to yield results. This is also a fact that the traditional methods and practices of raising plantations being adopted in the Forest department have not yielded required success for various reasons. The Miyawaki method of planting under such state of affairs offers a bright hope to meet the challenges of degradation and climate change. Atleast 10k sapling are densely planted in less than 0.5 hectare, largely addressing the space issue.  *This image is copyright of its original author New greens for urban resilience: Rapid urbanization occurring at the expense of agricultural and natural land cover is not only causing increased concretization turning our urban areas into urban heat islands posing significant threats to health and psychological well-being of citizens, ecosystem services, and cultural associations besides contributing to global climate change. Quote:As per one report of Govindarajulu, D.(2014) “with rising in urban population the per capita availability in many urban areas has reduced drastically and many cities in India already fall short of green space available per capita, which is much below the WHO recommended norms of 9 sq.m/capita”. Barring a few cities, almost all the Indian cities are having per capita green cover below the recommended norms of 9 sq.m/capita. City planners, policymakers, and residents have now realized and recognized the delicate link between human well-being of the urban population and urban forests and decided to shift their focus towards eco-cities or cities with green. By developing such eco-cities, the citizens apart from improving the existing urban greens are planning to manage to optimize ecosystem services through required policy initiatives and inclusive planning giving due credence to urban green spaces. Being multilayered and resilient, native environmental landscapes like the Miyawaki forests are capable of providing decorative and biodiversity values, lessening climatic disturbances, and facilitating harmony to the landscapes in the smaller or segregated extent of lands thereby becoming the best choices for urban landscape managers. Being one of the promising indicators of resilient cities, creation and maintenance of green cover by the adoption of diverse techniques and models provide an excellent alternative. Being one of the examples of nature-based solutions and best indicator of resilient cities, Miyawaki forests also help to integrate green and gray infrastructure of cities duly retrofitting into urban and industrial areas for the long-term objective of climate resilience. Miyawaki method also called the Potted Seedling Method is an afforestation technique that uses native species to create dense, multilayered forests. Photo by Arnold Joyce.  *This image is copyright of its original author Challenges ahead: Apart from its high popularity and attraction, criticism of Miyawaki is also being received among a few forestry professionals on the ground that the forests produced with induced or forced photosynthesis method (Miyawaki) cannot become the substitute for natural forests. Though the initial results of Miyawaki in selected locations are encouraging, the real impact of any intervention involving forestry species requires long-term study due to long rotation and such scientific research validating the claim of Miyawaki especially is lacking in countries like India having diverse agro-climatic zones. Absence of such sound validated research/studies is another challenge for considering this method as a new alternative to existing planting models for its universal adoption at a bigger scale in addition to the issue of financial concerns and required institutional arrangements. Citizen and NGOs associated with Miyawaki cite the collection of the seed of native and associated species as major challenges which require in-depth study involving time and dedication apart from active participation and cooperation from the forest department as the custodian of forests. The high cost of raising under Miyawaki is one of the stumbling blocks for its widespread adoption under ongoing afforestation programmes. One of the components under the Miyawaki method responsible for high raising cost is the enrichment of the soil. The degraded forests having good soil quality and proximity to the natural forest can provide cost reduction if selected to be covered under the Miyawaki method. The State of Telangana under its flagship programme of Harithaharam has also adopted the Miyawaki Method to be replicated in urban forest areas and municipalities. Leading the way, the Forest department of Telangana has already adopted this method for using in degraded forest areas duly revising the raising cost up to ₹6lakhs/hectare.[/font][/size][/color] In a short time, the Miyawaki method has gained immense popularity, especially in urban areas. Since urban soils are primarily refractory and degraded containing less humus we need to explore other ways and means to enrich the productivity of urban soils duly exploring the reuse of organic waste material by linking with local bodies. Involving local panchayats and municipalities for raising decentralized nurseries and utilizing biodegradable waste, funding tie-up under MGNREGA (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) or with local corporate groups by infusing their CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) funding and technological interventions suiting local agro-climatic conditions are a few areas to meet the challenges of high raising cost. Other cost reduction measures and modifications to technique suiting local environments need to be studied for its applicability at a wider scale and tackle diverse locations in urban areas. The uninterrupted availability of native and associate species and initial technical know-how can be facilitated by involving the local forest department. As most of the cities have good presence of Multinational Corporations (MNC), their active involvement to prioritize their CSR funding to the urban greening sector duly involving local NGOs associated with environmental conservation can make it an excellent workable model to enhance the urban green cover.  Some documents dealing with Adaptive Management
What is Adaptive Management?
Quote:Adaptive management is a systematic approach for improving resource management by learning from management outcomes (1). Its origin can be traced back to ideas of scientific management pioneered by Frederick Taylor in the early 1900s (2,3). Various perspectives on adaptive management are rooted in parallel concepts found in business (total quality management and learning organizations [4]), experimental science (hypothesis testing [5]), systems theory (feedback control [6]), and industrial ecology (7). The concept has attracted attention as a means of linking learning with policy and implementation (8,9). Although the idea of learning from experience and modifying subsequent behavior in light of that experience has long been reported in the literature, the specific idea of adaptive management as a strategy for natural resource management can be traced to the seminal work of Holling (10), Walters (11), and Lee (12). A call to embrace adaptive management for effective elephant conservation in Zimbabwe
Quote:Wildlife conservation is at a critical juncture across Africa, hamstrung by bureaucratic incompetence and the erosion of ethical principles, while wildlife populations are predominantly threatened by habitat fragmentation and indiscriminate killings.1,2 The Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (ZimParks) was once quintessential in Africa, among pioneers of the wildlife management front, inter alia, with effective protected area management, even authorising wildlife conservancies outside protected areas.1 ZimParks is expected to generate its own income from both non-consumptive and consumptive activities, such as ecotourism and sport hunting.1 However, a perennially lean budget, use of obsolete equipment, low morale among the staff, and a high staff turnover because of a low skills retention capacity constrain the activities of the department. Although ZimParks patrol teams are augmented by state police in major protected areas, rangers are sometimes injured or killed during contact with armed poachers with sophisticated weapons. The situation is continually made more dire by fraudulent tendencies, where ZimParks officers, state police and politicians are incessantly implicated as accomplices in wildlife poaching syndicates. On the other hand, the techniques used by poachers are dynamic, with recent elephant Loxodonta africana poaching tactics involving lacing water sources and salt licks with cyanide poison, which also kills secondary targets such as scavenging vulture species. Saving endangered species using adaptive management
Quote:Significance
A look at the wildlife crossing set to be built in LA
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Beaver's are the natural flood defence Britain has always needed
Beaver dams attenuate flow: A multi‐site study Abstract: Beavers can profoundly alter riparian environments, most conspicuously by creating dams and wetlands. Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber) populations are increasing and it has been suggested they could play a role in the provision of multiple ecosystem services, including natural flood management. Research at different scales, in contrasting ecosystems is required to establish to what extent beavers can impact on flood regimes. Therefore, this study determines whether flow regimes and flow responses to storm events were altered following the building of beaver dams and whether a flow attenuation effect could be significantly attributed to beaver activity. Four sites were monitored where beavers have been reintroduced in England. Continuous monitoring of hydrology, before and after beaver impacts, was undertaken on streams where beavers built sequences of dams. Stream orders ranged from 2nd to 4th, in both agricultural and forest‐dominated catchments. Analysis of >1000 storm events, across four sites showed an overall trend of reduced total stormflow, increased peak rainfall to peak flow lag times and reduced peak flows, all suggesting flow attenuation, following beaver impacts. Additionally, reduced high flow to low flow ratios indicated that flow regimes were overall becoming less “flashy” following beaver reintroduction. Statistical analysis, showed the effect of beaver to be statistically significant in reducing peak flows with estimated overall reductions in peak flows from −0.359 to −0.065 m3 s−1 across sites. Analysis showed spatial and temporal variability in the hydrological response to beaver between sites, depending on the level of impact and seasonality. Critically, the effect of beavers in reducing peak flows persists for the largest storms monitored, showing that even in wet conditions, beaver dams can attenuate average flood flows by up to ca. 60%. This research indicates that beavers could play a role in delivering natural flood management. |
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