Aligning science and policy to achieve evolutionarily enlightened conservation

There is increasing recognition among conservation scientists that long‐term conservation outcomes could be improved through better integration of evolutionary theory into management practices. Despite concerns that the importance of key concepts emerging from evolutionary theory (i.e., evolutionary principles and processes) are not being recognized by managers, there has been little effort to determine the level of integration of evolutionary theory into conservation policy and practice. We assessed conservation policy at 3 scales (international, national, and provincial) on 3 continents to quantify the degree to which key evolutionary concepts, such as genetic diversity and gene flow, are being incorporated into conservation practice. We also evaluated the availability of clear guidance within the applied evolutionary biology literature as to how managers can change their management practices to achieve better conservation outcomes. Despite widespread recognition of the importance of maintaining genetic diversity, conservation policies provide little guidance about how this can be achieved in practice and other relevant evolutionary concepts, such as inbreeding depression, are mentioned rarely. In some cases the poor integration of evolutionary concepts into management reflects a lack of decision‐support tools in the literature. Where these tools are available, such as risk‐assessment frameworks, they are not being adopted by conservation policy makers, suggesting that the availability of a strong evidence base is not the only barrier to evolutionarily enlightened management. We believe there is a clear need for more engagement by evolutionary biologists with policy makers to develop practical guidelines that will help managers make changes to conservation practice. There is also an urgent need for more research to better understand the barriers to and opportunities for incorporating evolutionary theory into conservation practice.     

Problems with mitigation translocation of herpetofauna

Mitigation translocation of nuisance animals is a commonly used management practice aimed at resolution of human–animal conflict by removal and release of an individual animal. Long considered a reasonable undertaking, especially by the general public, it is now known that translocated subjects are negatively affected by the practice. Mitigation translocation is typically undertaken with individual adult organisms and has a much lower success rate than the more widely practiced conservation translocation of threatened and endangered species. Nonetheless, the public and many conservation practitioners believe that because population‐level conservation translocations have been successful that mitigation translocation can be satisfactorily applied to a wide variety of human‐wildlife conflict situations. We reviewed mitigation translocations of reptiles, including our own work with 3 long‐lived species (Gila monsters [Heloderma suspectum], Sonoran desert tortoises [Gopherus morafkai], and western diamond‐backed rattlesnakes [Crotalus atrox]). Overall, mitigation translocation had a low success rate when judged either by effects on individuals (in all studies reviewed they exhibited increased movement or increased mortality) or by the success of the resolution of the human–animal conflict (translocated individuals often returned to the capture site). Careful planning and identification of knowledge gaps are critical to increasing success rates in mitigation translocations in the face of increasing pressure to find solutions for species threatened by diverse anthropogenic factors, including climate change and exurban and energy development. Problemas con la Mitigación por Traslocación de Herpetofauna     

Use of monitoring data to support conservation management and policy decisions in Micronesia

Adaptive management implies a continuous knowledge‐based decision‐making process in conservation. Yet, the coupling of scientific monitoring and management frameworks remains rare in practice because formal and informal communication pathways are lacking. We examined 4 cases in Micronesia where conservation practitioners are using new knowledge in the form of monitoring data to advance marine conservation. These cases were drawn from projects in Micronesia Challenge jurisdictions that received funding for coupled monitoring‐to‐management frameworks and encompassed all segments of adaptive management. Monitoring in Helen Reef, Republic of Palau, was catalyzed by coral bleaching and revealed evidence of overfishing that led to increased enforcement and outreach. In Nimpal Channel, Yap, Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), monitoring the recovery of marine food resources after customary restrictions were put in place led to new, more effective enforcement approaches. Monitoring in Laolao Bay, Saipan, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, was catalyzed by observable sediment loads from poor land‐use practices and resulted in actions that reduced land‐based threats, particularly littering and illegal burning, and revealed additional threats from overfishing. Pohnpei (FSM) began monitoring after observed declines in grouper spawning aggregations. This data led to adjusting marine conservation area boundaries and implementing market‐based size class restrictions. Two themes emerged from these cases. First, in each case monitoring was conducted in a manner relevant to the social and ecological systems and integrated into the decision‐making process. Second, conservation practitioners and scientists in these cases integrated culturally appropriate stakeholder engagement throughout all phases of the adaptive management cycle. More broadly, our study suggests, when describing adaptive management, providing more details on how monitoring and management activities are linked at similar spatial scales and across similar time frames can enhance the application of knowledge.     

The Need to Disentangle Key Concepts from Ecosystem‐Approach Jargon

The ecosystem approach—as endorsed by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CDB) in 2000—is a strategy for holistic, sustainable, and equitable natural resource management, to be implemented via the 12 Malawi Principles. These principles describe the need to manage nature in terms of dynamic ecosystems, while fully engaging with local peoples. It is an ambitious concept. Today, the term is common throughout the research and policy literature on environmental management. However, multiple meanings have been attached to the term, resulting in confusion. We reviewed references to the ecosystem approach from 1957 to 2012 and identified 3 primary uses: as an alternative to ecosystem management or ecosystem‐based management; in reference to an integrated and equitable approach to resource management as per the CBD; and as a term signifying a focus on understanding and valuing ecosystem services. Although uses of this term and its variants may overlap in meaning, typically, they do not entirely reflect the ethos of the ecosystem approach as defined by the CBD. For example, there is presently an increasing emphasis on ecosystem services, but focusing on these alone does not promote decentralization of management or use of all forms of knowledge, both of which are integral to the CBD's concept. We highlight that the Malawi Principles are at risk of being forgotten. To better understand these principles, more effort to implement them is required. Such efforts should be evaluated, ideally with comparative approaches, before allowing the CBD's concept of holistic and socially engaged management to be abandoned or superseded. It is possible that attempts to implement all 12 principles together will face many challenges, but they may also offer a unique way to promote holistic and equitable governance of natural resources. Therefore, we believe that the CBD's concept of the ecosystem approach demands more attention. La Necesidad de Desenredar Conceptos Clave del Argot Ambiente‐Estrategia     

A novel holistic framework for genetic‐based captive‐breeding and reintroduction programs

Research in reintroduction biology has provided a greater understanding of the often limited success of species reintroductions and highlighted the need for scientifically rigorous approaches in reintroduction programs. We examined the recent genetic‐based captive‐breeding and reintroduction literature to showcase the underuse of the genetic data gathered. We devised a framework that takes full advantage of the genetic data through assessment of the genetic makeup of populations before (past component of the framework), during (present component), and after (future component) captive‐breeding and reintroduction events to understand their conservation potential and maximize their success. We empirically applied our framework to two small fishes: Yarra pygmy perch (Nannoperca obscura) and southern pygmy perch (Nannoperca australis). Each of these species has a locally adapted and geographically isolated lineage that is endemic to the highly threatened lower Murray–Darling Basin in Australia. These two populations were rescued during Australia's recent decade‐long Millennium Drought, when their persistence became entirely dependent on captive‐breeding and subsequent reintroduction efforts. Using historical demographic analyses, we found differences and similarities between the species in the genetic impacts of past natural and anthropogenic events that occurred in situ, such as European settlement (past component). Subsequently, successful maintenance of genetic diversity in captivity—despite skewed brooder contribution to offspring—was achieved through carefully managed genetic‐based breeding (present component). Finally, genetic monitoring revealed the survival and recruitment of released captive‐bred offspring in the wild (future component). Our holistic framework often requires no additional data collection to that typically gathered in genetic‐based breeding programs, is applicable to a wide range of species, advances the genetic considerations of reintroduction programs, and is expected to improve with the use of next‐generation sequencing technology.     

Prioritizing islands for the eradication of invasive vertebrates in the United Kingdom overseas territories

Invasive alien species are one of the primary threats to native biodiversity on islands worldwide. Consequently, eradicating invasive species from islands has become a mainstream conservation practice. Deciding which islands have the highest priority for eradication is of strategic importance to allocate limited resources to achieve maximum conservation benefit. Previous island prioritizations focused either on a narrow set of native species or on a small geographic area. We devised a prioritization approach that incorporates all threatened native terrestrial vertebrates and all invasive terrestrial vertebrates occurring on 11 U.K. overseas territories, which comprise over 2000 islands ranging from the sub‐Antarctic to the tropics. Our approach includes eradication feasibility and distinguishes between the potential and realistic conservation value of an eradication, which reflects the benefit that would accrue following eradication of either all invasive species or only those species for which eradication techniques currently exist. We identified the top 25 priority islands for invasive species eradication that together would benefit extant populations of 155 native species including 45 globally threatened species. The 5 most valuable islands included the 2 World Heritage islands Gough (South Atlantic) and Henderson (South Pacific) that feature unique seabird colonies, and Anegada, Little Cayman, and Guana Island in the Caribbean that feature a unique reptile fauna. This prioritization can be rapidly repeated if new information or techniques become available, and the approach could be replicated elsewhere in the world. Priorización de Islas para la Erradicación de Vertebrados Invasores en los Territorios Exteriores del Reino Unido     

Incentivizing biodiversity conservation in artisanal fishing communities through territorial user rights and business model innovation

Territorial user rights for fisheries are being promoted to enhance the sustainability of small‐scale fisheries. Using Chile as a case study, we designed a market‐based program aimed at improving fishers’ livelihoods while incentivizing the establishment and enforcement of no‐take areas within areas managed with territorial user right regimes. Building on explicit enabling conditions (i.e., high levels of governance, participation, and empowerment), we used a place‐based, human‐centered approach to design a program that will have the necessary support and buy‐in from local fishers to result in landscape‐scale biodiversity benefits. Transactional infrastructure must be complex enough to capture the biodiversity benefits being created, but simple enough so that the program can be scaled up and is attractive to potential financiers. Biodiversity benefits created must be commoditized, and desired behavioral changes must be verified within a transactional context. Demand must be generated for fisher‐created biodiversity benefits in order to attract financing and to scale the market model. Important design decisions around these 3 components—supply, transactional infrastructure, and demand—must be made based on local social‐ecological conditions. Our market model, which is being piloted in Chile, is a flexible foundation on which to base scalable opportunities to operationalize a scheme that incentivizes local, verifiable biodiversity benefits via conservation behaviors by fishers that could likely result in significant marine conservation gains and novel cross‐sector alliances. Incentivar la Conservación de la Biodiversidad con Comunidades de Pesca Artesanal por medio de Derechos de Uso Territorial y la Innovación de Modelos de Negocio     

Effect of risk aversion on prioritizing conservation projects

Conservation outcomes are uncertain. Agencies making decisions about what threat mitigation actions to take to save which species frequently face the dilemma of whether to invest in actions with high probability of success and guaranteed benefits or to choose projects with a greater risk of failure that might provide higher benefits if they succeed. The answer to this dilemma lies in the decision maker's aversion to risk—their unwillingness to accept uncertain outcomes. Little guidance exists on how risk preferences affect conservation investment priorities. Using a prioritization approach based on cost effectiveness, we compared 2 approaches: a conservative probability threshold approach that excludes investment in projects with a risk of management failure greater than a fixed level, and a variance‐discounting heuristic used in economics that explicitly accounts for risk tolerance and the probabilities of management success and failure. We applied both approaches to prioritizing projects for 700 of New Zealand's threatened species across 8303 management actions. Both decision makers’ risk tolerance and our choice of approach to dealing with risk preferences drove the prioritization solution (i.e., the species selected for management). Use of a probability threshold minimized uncertainty, but more expensive projects were selected than with variance discounting, which maximized expected benefits by selecting the management of species with higher extinction risk and higher conservation value. Explicitly incorporating risk preferences within the decision making process reduced the number of species expected to be safe from extinction because lower risk tolerance resulted in more species being excluded from management, but the approach allowed decision makers to choose a level of acceptable risk that fit with their ability to accommodate failure. We argue for transparency in risk tolerance and recommend that decision makers accept risk in an adaptive management framework to maximize benefits and avoid potential extinctions due to inefficient allocation of limited resources. El Efecto de la Aversión de Riesgo sobre la Priorización de Proyectos de Conservación     

The challenge of implementing the European network of protected areas Natura 2000

Established under the European Union (EU) Birds and Habitats Directives, Natura 2000 is one of the largest international networks of protected areas. With the spatial designation of sites by the EU member states almost finalized, the biggest challenge still lying ahead is the appropriate management of the sites. To evaluate the cross‐scale functioning of Natura 2000 implementation, we analyzed 242 questionnaires completed by conservation scientists involved in the implementation of Natura 2000 in 24 EU member states. Respondents identified 7 key drivers of the quality of Natura 2000 implementation. Ordered in decreasing evaluation score, these drivers included: network design, use of external resources, legal frame, scientific input, procedural frame, social input, and national or local policy. Overall, conservation scientists were moderately satisfied with the implementation of Natura 2000. Tree modeling revealed that poor application of results of environmental impact assessments (EIA) was considered a major constraint. The main strengths of the network included the substantial increase of scientific knowledge of the sites, the contribution of nongovernmental organizations, the adequate network design in terms of area and representativeness, and the adequacy of the EU legal frame. The main weaknesses of Natura 2000 were the lack of political will from local and national governments toward effective implementation; the negative attitude of local stakeholders; the lack of background knowledge of local stakeholders, which prevented well‐informed policy decisions; and the understaffing of Natura 2000 management authorities. Top suggestions to improve Natura 2000 implementation were increase public awareness, provide environmental education to local communities, involve high‐quality conservation experts, strengthen quality control of EIA studies, and establish a specific Natura 2000 fund. El Reto de Implementar la Red Europea de Áreas Protegidas Natura 2000