Portrayals of Endangered Species in Advertising: Exercising Intertextuality to Question the Anthropocentric Lens

This paper examines recent advertisements used by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to raise awareness about the predicament of endangered, vulnerable, and threatened species. By engaging in a critical discourse analysis of a selection of advertisements, this study demonstrates how the WWF uses intertextuality as a discourse strategy to articulate its message and objectives. In this paper, I argue that by engaging in the juxtaposition of various paratexts (“layers of meaning”), the WWF produces a narrative which reveals an anthropocentric lens through which we view the world. The advertisements are found to resort to paratexts of anthropomorphism with the intent of extending the bounds of personhood to non-human animal species. In closing, I maintain that intertextuality is employed not only to question the dominant human-centric paradigm, but serve the heuristic function of encouraging a more empathetic identification with the animals in question and the creation of a more holistic worldview.     

忻州市土地利用现状的环境敏感区分析

随着新一轮土地利用规划修编展开,针对忻州市土地利用存在的环境问题,利用调查资料和相关研究成果,有效管理土地利用空间向环境敏感地区伸展,减缓环境敏感地区的环境压力和生态胁迫,为市域土地利用方式和分区方案制定提供环境敏感性依据.从规划方案与面临的土地生态问题入手,划分生态环境、水源保护、污染影响、优质农田以及煤矿塌陷五类环境敏感区,并进行忻州市环境敏感地综合评价,明确其空间分布范围.研究结果表明,极高敏感、高敏感区占全市总面积的4%,较高敏感区和一般敏感区分别占10.5%和7.5%,低敏感区和非敏感区分别占40%和38%.通过分析规划土地利用功能分区方案与环境的协调性, 在土地利用规划过程中,提出土地利用方式和空间布局优化对策.     

石家庄地区雾霾天气下云滴和云凝结核的分布特征

2009年5~10月在石家庄地区对雾霾天气下的近地面到高空的云雾滴和云凝结核(CCN)进行了7架次飞机探测.利用PMS云粒子测量仪器、机载温湿仪和连续气流纵向热梯度云凝结核仪获得的云雾粒子和云凝结核(CCN)探测资料,分析了层积云(Sc)和高积云(Ac)中云粒子浓度、液态含水量、粒子算术平均直径和粒子有效平均直径的垂直分布特征;分析了CCN垂直和水平分布特征以及谱分布.结果表明雾霾天气状况下,云滴数浓度在102个/cm3量级上.高云粒子粒径总体大于低云粒子.云含水量平均值范围为0.03~0.14g/m3;地面到600 m高度内, CCN值的平均值为3034cm-3(过饱和度S=0.3%).对CCN的活化谱进行拟合表明石家庄属于典型大陆性核谱,云对CCN有消耗作用,逆温层的存在使得该区CCN浓度累积增加.     

土壤溶液中镉的化学形态及化学平衡研究

据土壤溶液的实际情况建立简便的平衡模式,研究了红壤、黄棕壤、黄潮土三种典型土壤溶液中Cd的化学形态和化学平衡.结果表明,溶液中Cd的主要形态为Cd~(2+)、CdCl~+和CdSO_4~6.黄潮土还有一定量的CdHCO_3~+,其它形态Cd很少,其中游离Cd~(2+)占绝大部分.红壤最高,黄棕壤次之.红壤施石灰后游离Cd~(2+)下降,CdSO_4~6增加;添加氯化物后,溶液pH下降,大量Cd进入溶液中,CdCl~+比例明显升高.溶液中Cd的形态分布与土壤Cd的生物有效性有一定关系.此外,溶解度图证明,供试土壤中不可能有Cd的矿物生成.Cd在固液相间的平衡受吸附解吸反应控制.     

20世纪初以来沂蒙山区森林植被动态及其对气候变化的响应——基于遥感和树轮的研究

遥感能够直接反映植被生长信息,但目前观测时间较短;树轮资料可以弥补遥感手段的不足,但往往缺乏与植被生长状况（如植被生产力）的直接关联。已有研究往往计算不同植被指数指标和树轮指数的相关性,并基于此来重建长时间尺度的植被动态信息。但基于相关性所选取的指标在不同地区存在较大差异,不利于空间对比研究。以沂蒙山区为研究区,选取能够有效表征植被年初级生产力的生长季NDVI累积值指标,利用Bootstrap法建立了其与树轮宽度的关系,重建了20世纪初期以来植被动态时间序列,并分析了变化特征及其与气候变化的关系。结果表明：沂山地区生长季NDVI累积值的多年平均值为7.36,低于蒙山和塔山地区;蒙山地区植被状况呈现好转趋势,特别是20世纪90年代之后植被好转趋势更加明显,而塔山和沂山地区植被无显著变化。小波分析结果表明研究区植被动态存在较显著的2 a、4 a或8 a尺度的周期变化,与生长季帕尔默干旱指数及平均温度的周期变化相一致,但干旱指数与植被动态具有更高的相关性。本研究综合运用树轮与遥感技术发展了长时间尺度植被动态时间序列重建方法,有助于更好地理解植被动态及其对气候变化的响应。     

陕南农村冬季PM_(2.5)主要化学组分特征

通过对陕南农村冬季PM_(2.5)采样分析,获得PM_(2.5)质量浓度及主要化学组分特征。PM_(2.5)平均质量浓度为89.5±42.0μg·m~(-3),超过国家二级标准。观测期间PM_(2.5)中OC、EC浓度平均值分别为16.0±6.9μg·m~(-3)和5.7±3.2μg·m~(-3),OC/EC平均比值为3.0±0.4。主要水溶性离子组分为NO_3~-、SO_4~(2-)和NH_4~+。粒子数浓度与表面积浓度峰值主要集中在0.5μm以下粒径段。PAHs、BeP和BaP平均质量浓度分别为48.9±10.9 ng·m~(-3)、3.0±0.9 ng·m~(-3)和1.2±0.7 ng·m~(-3),PAHs污染较严重,强致癌物BaP浓度超过国家环境空气质量标准年平均浓度限值。当地农村以石煤为主的能源结构及采用的燃烧方式是导致污染的重要因素。     

Quantifying the squeezing or stretching of fisheries as they adapt to displacement by marine reserves

The designation of no‐take marine reserves involves social and economic concerns due to the resulting displacement of fishing effort, when fishing rights are removed from those who traditionally fished within an area. Displacement can influence the functioning of the fishery and success of the reserve, yet levels of displacement are seldom quantified after reserve implementation and very rarely before that. We devised a simple analytical framework based on set theory to facilitate reserve placement. Implementation of the framework requires maps of fishing grounds, fishing effort, or catch per unit effort for at least 2 years. The framework quantifies the level of conflict that a reserve designation might cause in the fishing sector due to displacement and the opportunities to offset the conflict through fisher spatial mobility (i.e., ability of fishers to fish elsewhere). We also considered how the outputs of the framework can be used to identify targeted management interventions for each fishery. We applied the method in Honduras, where the largest marine protected area in Central America is being placed, for which spatial data on fishing effort were available for 6 fisheries over 3 years. The proposed closure had a greater negative impact on the shrimp and lobster scuba fisheries, which concentrated respectively 28% and 18% of their effort inside the reserve. These fisheries could not accommodate the displacement within existing fishing grounds. Both would be forced to stretch into new fishing grounds, which are available but are of unknown quality. These stakeholders will likely require compensation to offset costly exploratory fishing or to travel to fishing grounds farther away from port.     

Effects of productivity on biodiversity in forest ecosystems across the United States and China

In the global campaign against biodiversity loss in forest ecosystems, land managers need to know the status of forest biodiversity, but practical guidelines for conserving biodiversity in forest management are lacking. A major obstacle is the incomplete understanding of the relationship between site primary productivity and plant diversity, due to insufficient ecosystem‐wide data, especially for taxonomically and structurally diverse forest ecosystems. We investigated the effects of site productivity (the site's inherent capacity to grow timber) on tree species richness across 19 types of forest ecosystems in North America and China through 3 ground‐sourced forest inventory data sets (U.S. Forest Inventory and Analysis, Cooperative Alaska Forest Inventory, and Chinese Forest Management Planning Inventory). All forest types conformed to a consistent and highly significant (P < 0.001) hump‐shaped unimodal relationship, of which the generalized coefficients of determination averaged 20.5% over all the forest types. That is, tree species richness first increased as productivity increased at a progressively slower rate, and, after reaching a maximum, richness started to decline. Our consistent findings suggest that forests of high productivity would sustain few species because they consist mostly of flat homogeneous areas lacking an environmental gradient along which a diversity of species with different habitats can coexist. The consistency of the productivity–biodiversity relationship among the 3 data sets we examined makes it possible to quantify the expected tree species richness that a forest stand is capable of sustaining, and a comparison between the actual species richness and the sustainable values can be useful in prioritizing conservation efforts.     

Defining and Evaluating the Umbrella Species Concept for Conserving and Restoring Landscape Connectivity

Conserving or restoring landscape connectivity between patches of breeding habitat is a common strategy to protect threatened species from habitat fragmentation. By managing connectivity for some species, usually charismatic vertebrates, it is often assumed that these species will serve as conservation umbrellas for other species. We tested this assumption by developing a quantitative method to measure overlap in dispersal habitat of 3 threatened species—a bird (the umbrella), a butterfly, and a frog—inhabiting the same fragmented landscape. Dispersal habitat was determined with Circuitscape, which was parameterized with movement data collected for each species. Despite differences in natural history and breeding habitat, we found substantial overlap in the spatial distributions of areas important for dispersal of this suite of taxa. However, the intuitive umbrella species (the bird) did not have the highest overlap with other species in terms of the areas that supported connectivity. Nevertheless, we contend that when there are no irreconcilable differences between the dispersal habitats of species that cohabitate on the landscape, managing for umbrella species can help conserve or restore connectivity simultaneously for multiple threatened species with different habitat requirements. Definición y Evaluación del Concepto de Especie Paraguas para Conservar y Restaurar la Conectividad de Paisajes     

Potential Negative Ecological Effects of Corridors

Despite many studies showing that landscape corridors increase dispersal and species richness for disparate taxa, concerns persist that corridors can have unintended negative effects. In particular, some of the same mechanisms that underlie positive effects of corridors on species of conservation interest may also increase the spread and impact of antagonistic species (e.g., predators and pathogens), foster negative effects of edges, increase invasion by exotic species, increase the spread of unwanted disturbances such as fire, or increase population synchrony and thus reduce persistence. We conducted a literature review and meta‐analysis to evaluate the prevalence of each of these negative effects. We found no evidence that corridors increase unwanted disturbance or non‐native species invasion; however, these have not been well‐studied concerns (1 and 6 studies, respectively). Other effects of corridors were more often studied and yielded inconsistent results; mean effect sizes were indistinguishable from zero. The effect of edges on abundances of target species was as likely to be positive as negative. Corridors were as likely to have no effect on antagonists or population synchrony as they were to increase those negative effects. We found 3 deficiencies in the literature. First, despite studies on how corridors affect predators, there are few studies of related consequences for prey population size and persistence. Second, properly designed studies of negative corridor effects are needed in natural corridors at scales larger than those achievable in experimental systems. Third, studies are needed to test more targeted hypotheses about when corridor‐mediated effects on invasive species or disturbance may be negative for species of management concern. Overall, we found no overarching support for concerns that construction and maintenance of habitat corridors may result in unintended negative consequences. Negative edge effects may be mitigated by widening corridors or softening edges between corridors and the matrix. Other negative effects are relatively small and manageable compared with the large positive effects of facilitating dispersal and increasing diversity of native species. Efectos Negativos Potenciales de los Corredores