Exposure assessment of operators to pesticides in Kongou,a sub-watershed of Niger River valley

The use of pesticides in horticultural sector in Niger has become an integral part of modern agriculture. Nevertheless, their inappropriate use can generate negative health effects to operators. A study was carried out among Kongou farmers in order to assess their potential dermal exposure (PDE). The UK-POEM model was used to quantify the PDE during mixing/loading and application according to the local practices. In order to determine which parts of the operator body are subject to most contamination during spraying and to validate the theoretical model used, a patch method was used with a tartrazine dye. The deposits of the tartrazine on patches were measured by colorimetry thanks to the absorbance value determined after their extraction in water and a calibration curve. A total of ten spraying trials (five trials with the hand-held sprayer and five others with the backpack sprayer) were performed by different producers at 0.5 and 1 m height for each trial. The survey shows that 92% of the farmers are illiterate and the most common active substances identified are organophosphate or pyrethroids insecticides. Seventy percent of operators do not use any personal protective equipment (PPE) during mixing/loading or spraying. The predictive systemic exposure levels vary from 0.0027?mg kg^?1 bw per day to 0.7692?mg kg^?1 bw per day for backpack sprayer and from 0.0261?mg kg^?1 bw per day to 0.9788?mg kg^?1 bw per day for hand-held sprayer, several times higher the Acceptable Operator Exposure Level (AOEL) for some actives substances. Theoretical modeling indicates more exposure of operator by a hand-held sprayer than a backpack sprayer. The patch method results show that the deposits of dye increase when the position of sprayer nozzle increases from 0.5 to 1 m for the two sprayers. All parts of the operator body are contaminated but lower body parts and chest are the most exposed. The patch method results also show that hand spraying contaminates operator more than backpack spraying, confirming the results of the theoretical model.     

Assessing effects of non-native crayfish on mosquito survival

Introductions of non-native predators often reduce biodiversity and affect natural predator–prey relationships and may increase the abundance of potential disease vectors (e.g., mosquitoes) indirectly through competition or predation cascades. The Santa Monica Mountains (California, U.S.A.), situated in a global biodiversity hotspot, is an area of conservation concern due to climate change, urbanization, and the introduction of non-native species. We examined the effect of non-native crayfish (Procambarus clarkii) on an existing native predator, dragonfly nymphs (Aeshna sp.), and their mosquito larvae (Anopheles sp.) prey. We used laboratory experiments to compare the predation efficiency of both predators, separately and together, and field data on counts of dragonfly nymphs and mosquito larvae sampled from 13 local streams. We predicted a lower predation efficiency of crayfish compared with native dragonfly nymphs and a reduced predation efficiency of dragonfly nymphs in the presence of crayfish. Dragonfly nymphs were an order of magnitude more efficient predators than crayfish, and dragonfly nymph predation efficiency was reduced in the presence of crayfish. Field count data showed that populations of dragonfly nymphs and mosquito larvae were strongly correlated with crayfish presence in streams, such that sites with crayfish tended to have fewer dragonfly nymphs and more mosquito larvae. Under natural conditions, it is likely that crayfish reduce the abundance of dragonfly nymphs and their predation efficiency and thereby, directly and indirectly, lead to higher mosquito populations and a loss of ecosystem services related to disease vector control.     

The spillover of race and racial attitudes into public opinion about climate change

The relationship between racial attitudes and public opinion about climate change is examined. Public opinion data from Pew and American National Election Studies surveys are used to show that racial identification and prejudices are increasingly correlated with opinions about climate change during the Obama presidency. Results show that racial identification became a significant predictor of climate change concern following Obama’s election in 2008, and that high levels of racial resentment are strongly correlated with reduced agreement with the scientific consensus on climate change. These results offer evidence for an effect termed the spillover of racialization. This helps further explain why the public remains so polarized on climate change, given the extent to which racial grievances and identities have become entangled with elite communication about climate change and its related policies today.     

Perceived mastery climate,felt trust,and knowledge sharing

Interpersonal trust is associated with a range of adaptive outcomes, including knowledge sharing. However, to date, our knowledge of antecedents and consequences of employees feeling trusted by supervisors in organizations remains limited. On the basis of a multisource, multiwave field study among 956 employees from 5 Norwegian organizations, we examined the predictive roles of perceived mastery climate and employee felt trust for employees' knowledge sharing. Drawing on the achievement goal theory, we develop and test a model to demonstrate that when employees perceive a mastery climate, they are more likely to feel trusted by their supervisors at both the individual and group levels. Moreover, the relationship between employees' perceptions of a mastery climate and supervisor‐rated knowledge sharing is mediated by perceptions of being trusted by the supervisor. Theoretical contributions and practical implications of our findings are discussed.     

Correction to: Opportunities to reduce nutrient inputs to the Baltic Sea by improving manure use efficiency in agriculture

While progress has been made in reducing external nutrient inputs to the Baltic Sea, further actions are needed to meet the goals of the Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP), especially for the Baltic Proper, Gulf of Finland, and Gulf of Riga sub-basins. We used the net anthropogenic nitrogen and phosphorus inputs (NANI and NAPI, respectively) nutrient accounting approach to construct three scenarios of reduced NANI-NAPI. Reductions assumed that manure nutrients were redistributed from areas with intense animal production to areas that focus on crop production and would otherwise import synthetic and mineral fertilizers. We also used the Simple as Necessary Baltic Long Term Large Scale (SANBALTS) model to compare eutrophication conditions for the scenarios to current and BSAP-target conditions. The scenarios suggest that reducing NANI-NAPI by redistributing manure nutrients, together with improving agronomic practices, could meet 54–82% of the N reductions targets (28–43 kt N reduction) and 38–64% P reduction targets (4–6.6 kt P reduction), depending on scenario. SANBALTS output showed that even partial fulfillment of nutrient reduction targets could have ameliorating effects on eutrophication conditions. Meeting BSAP targets will require addressing additional sources, such as sewage. A common approach to apportioning sources to external nutrients loads could enable further assessment of the feasibility of eutrophication management targets.

     

Backwater Confluences of the Ohio River: Organic and Inorganic Fingerprints Explain Sediment Dynamics in Wetlands and Marinas

In the Ohio River (OR), backwater confluence sedimentation dynamics are understudied, however, these river features are expected to be influential on the system’s ecological and economic function when integrated along the river’s length. In the following paper, we test the efficacy of organic and inorganic tracers for sediment fingerprinting in backwater confluences; we use fingerprinting results to evidence sediment dynamics controlling deposition patterns in confluences used for wetland and marina functions; and we quantify the spatial extent of tributary drainages with wetland and marina features in OR confluences. Both organic and inorganic tracers statistically differentiate sediment from stream and river end‐members. Carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes produce greater uncertainty in fingerprinting results than inorganic elemental tracers. Uncertainty analysis of the nonconservative tracer term in the organic matter fingerprinting application estimates an apparent enrichment of the carbon stable isotopes during instream residence, and the nonconservativeness is quantified with a statistical approach unique to the fingerprinting literature. Wetland and marina features in OR confluences impact 42% and 11% of tributary drainage areas, respectively. Sediment dynamics show wetland and marina confluences experience deposition from river backwaters with longitudinally linear and nonlinear patterns, respectively, from sediment sources.     

A Bayesian hierarchical approach to quantifying stakeholder attitudes toward conservation in the presence of reporting error

Stakeholder support is vital for achieving conservation success, yet there are few reliable mechanisms to monitor stakeholder attitudes toward conservation. Approaches used to assess attitudes rarely account for bias arising from reporting error, which can lead to falsely reporting a positive attitude toward conservation (false-positive error) or not reporting a positive attitude when the respondent has a positive attitude toward conservation (false-negative error). Borrowing from developments in applied conservation science, we used a Bayesian hierarchical model to quantify stakeholder attitudes as the probability of having a positive attitude toward wildlife notionally (or in abstract terms) and at localized scales while accounting for reporting error. We compared estimates from our model, Likert scores, and naïve estimates (i.e., proportion of respondents reporting a positive attitude in at least 1 question that was only susceptible to false-negative error) with true stakeholder attitudes through simulations. We then applied the model in a survey of tea estate staff on their attitudes toward Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) in the Kaziranga–Karbi Anglong landscape of northeast India. In simulations, Bayesian model estimates of stakeholder attitudes toward wildlife were less biased than naïve estimates or Likert scores. After accounting for reporting errors, we estimated the probability of having a positive attitude toward elephants notionally as 0.85 in the Kaziranga landscape, whereas the proportion of respondents who had positive attitudes toward elephants at a localized scale was 0.50. In comparison, without accounting for reporting errors, naïve estimates of proportions of respondents with positive attitudes toward elephants were 0.69 and 0.23 notionally and at local scales, respectively. False (positive and negative) reporting probabilities were consistently not 0 (0.22–0.68). Regular and reliable assessment of stakeholder attitudes–combined with inference on drivers of positive attitudes–can help assess the success of initiatives aimed at facilitating human behavioral change and inform conservation decision making.     

Assessing ecological function in the context of species recovery

Species interactions matter to conservation. Setting an ambitious recovery target for a species requires considering the size, density, and demographic structure of its populations such that they fulfill the interactions, roles, and functions of the species in the ecosystems in which they are embedded. A recently proposed framework for an International Union for Conservation of Nature Green List of Species formalizes this requirement by defining a fully recovered species in terms of representation, viability, and functionality. Defining and quantifying ecological function from the viewpoint of species recovery is challenging in concept and application, but also an opportunity to insert ecological theory into conservation practice. We propose 2 complementary approaches to assessing a species’ ecological functions: confirmation (listing interactions of the species, identifying ecological processes and other species involved in these interactions, and quantifying the extent to which the species contributes to the identified ecological process) and elimination (inferring functionality by ruling out symptoms of reduced functionality, analogous to the red-list approach that focuses on symptoms of reduced viability). Despite the challenges, incorporation of functionality into species recovery planning is possible in most cases and it is essential to a conservation vision that goes beyond preventing extinctions and aims to restore a species to levels beyond what is required for its viability. This vision focuses on conservation and recovery at the species level and sees species as embedded in ecosystems, influencing and being influenced by the processes in those ecosystems. Thus, it connects and integrates conservation at the species and ecosystem levels.     

Effectiveness of Panama as an intercontinental land bridge for large mammals

Habitat fragmentation is a primary driver of wildlife loss, and establishment of biological corridors is a common strategy to mitigate this problem. A flagship example is the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor (MBC), which aims to connect protected forest areas between Mexico and Panama to allow dispersal and gene flow of forest organisms. Because forests across Central America have continued to degrade, the functioning of the MBC has been questioned, but reliable estimates of species occurrence were unavailable. Large mammals are suitable indicators of forest functioning, so we assessed their conservation status across the Isthmus of Panama, the narrowest section of the MBC. We used large-scale camera-trap surveys and hierarchical multispecies occupancy models in a Bayesian framework to estimate the occupancy of 9 medium to large mammals and developed an occupancy-weighted connectivity metric to evaluate species-specific functional connectivity. White-lipped peccary (Tayassu pecari), jaguar (Panthera onca), giant anteater (Myrmecophaga tridactyla), white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), and tapir (Tapirus bairdii) had low expected occupancy along the MBC in Panama. Puma (Puma concolor), red brocket deer (Mazama temama), ocelot (Leopardus pardalis), and collared peccary (Pecari tajacu), which are more adaptable, had higher occupancy, even in areas with low forest cover near infrastructure. However, the majority of species were subject to ≥1 gap that was larger than their known dispersal distances, suggesting poor connectivity along the MBC in Panama. Based on our results, forests in Darien, Donoso–Santa Fe, and La Amistad International Park are critical for survival of large terrestrial mammals in Panama and 2 areas need restoration.     

Using vertebrate environmental DNA from seawater in biomonitoring of marine habitats

Conservation and management of marine biodiversity depends on biomonitoring of marine habitats, but current approaches are resource-intensive and require different approaches for different organisms. Environmental DNA (eDNA) extracted from water samples is an efficient and versatile approach to detecting aquatic animals. In the ocean, eDNA composition reflects local fauna at fine spatial scales, but little is known about the effectiveness of eDNA-based monitoring of marine communities at larger scales. We investigated the potential of eDNA to characterize and distinguish marine communities at large spatial scales by comparing vertebrate species composition among marine habitats in Qatar, the Arabian Gulf (also known as the Persian Gulf), based on eDNA metabarcoding of seawater samples. We conducted species accumulation analyses to estimate how much of the vertebrate diversity we detected. We obtained eDNA sequences from a diverse assemblage of marine vertebrates, spanning 191 taxa in 73 families. These included rare and endangered species and covered 36% of the bony fish genera previously recorded in the Gulf. Sites of similar habitat type were also similar in eDNA composition. The species accumulation analyses showed that the number of sample replicates was insufficient for some sampling sites but suggested that a few hundred eDNA samples could potentially capture >90% of the marine vertebrate diversity in the study area. Our results confirm that seawater samples contain habitat-characteristic molecular signatures and that eDNA monitoring can efficiently cover vertebrate diversity at scales relevant to national and regional conservation and management.