Understanding implications of consumer behavior for wildlife farming and sustainable wildlife trade

Unsustainable wildlife trade affects biodiversity and the livelihoods of communities dependent upon those resources. Wildlife farming has been proposed to promote sustainable trade, but characterizing markets and understanding consumer behavior remain neglected but essential steps in the design and evaluation of such operations. We used sea turtle trade in the Cayman Islands, where turtles have been farm raised for human consumption for almost 50 years, as a case study to explore consumer preferences toward wild‐sourced (illegal) and farmed (legal) products and potential conservation implications. Combining methods innovatively (including indirect questioning and choice experiments), we conducted a nationwide trade assessment through in‐person interviews from September to December 2014. Households were randomly selected using disproportionate stratified sampling, and responses were weighted based on district population size. We approached 597 individuals, of which 37 (6.2%) refused to participate. Although 30% of households had consumed turtle in the previous 12 months, the purchase and consumption of wild products was rare (e.g., 64–742 resident households consumed wild turtle meat [i.e., 0.3–3.5% of households] but represented a large threat to wild turtles in the area due to their reduced populations). Differences among groups of consumers were marked, as identified through choice experiments, and price and source of product played important roles in their decisions. Despite the long‐term practice of farming turtles, 13.5% of consumers showed a strong preference for wild products, which demonstrates the limitations of wildlife farming as a single tool for sustainable wildlife trade. By using a combination of indirect questioning, choice experiments, and sales data to investigate demand for wildlife products, we obtained insights about consumer behavior that can be used to develop conservation‐demand‐focused initiatives. Lack of data from long‐term social–ecological assessments hinders the evaluation of and learning from wildlife farming. This information is key to understanding under which conditions different interventions (e.g., bans, wildlife farming, social marketing) are likely to succeed.     

Fishing‐gear restrictions and biomass gains for coral reef fishes in marine protected areas

Considerable empirical evidence supports recovery of reef fish populations with fishery closures. In countries where full exclusion of people from fishing may be perceived as inequitable, fishing‐gear restrictions on nonselective and destructive gears may offer socially relevant management alternatives to build recovery of fish biomass. Even so, few researchers have statistically compared the responses of tropical reef fisheries to alternative management strategies. We tested for the effects of fishery closures and fishing gear restrictions on tropical reef fish biomass at the community and family level. We conducted 1,396 underwater surveys at 617 unique sites across a spatial hierarchy within 22 global marine ecoregions that represented 5 realms. We compared total biomass across local fish assemblages and among 20 families of reef fishes inside marine protected areas (MPAs) with different fishing restrictions: no‐take, hook‐and‐line fishing only, several fishing gears allowed, and sites open to all fishing gears. We included a further category representing remote sites, where fishing pressure is low. As expected, full fishery closures, (i.e., no‐take zones) most benefited community‐ and family‐level fish biomass in comparison with restrictions on fishing gears and openly fished sites. Although biomass responses to fishery closures were highly variable across families, some fishery targets (e.g., Carcharhinidae and Lutjanidae) responded positively to multiple restrictions on fishing gears (i.e., where gears other than hook and line were not permitted). Remoteness also positively affected the response of community‐level fish biomass and many fish families. Our findings provide strong support for the role of fishing restrictions in building recovery of fish biomass and indicate important interactions among fishing‐gear types that affect biomass of a diverse set of reef fish families.     

Prenatal diagnosis and molecular cytogenetic characterisation of a small de novo interstitial duplication 16q11.2-q13

We describe the first prenatally detected case of a small de novo interstitial duplication of chromosome 16q. This chromosomal aberration is extremely rare. Amniocentesis was indicated by advanced maternal age only. Ultrasound examinations of the foetus showed no abnormalities. Conventional and molecular cytogenetic analyses on cultured amniocytes by comparative genomic hybridisation (CGH) and fluorescence in situ hybridisation (FISH) using partial chromosome paints and a locus-specific YAC clone revealed a de novo direct duplication of the chromosomal region 16q11.2-q13 leading to a partial trisomy 16q (46,XX,dup(16)(q11.2q13)). There are only five postnatal reports of comparable duplications involving this chromosomal region. These patients presented with little or no associated dysmorphic features but with significant neurodevelopmental delay and severe behavioural problems. After genetic counselling, the parents opted for termination of pregnancy. Post-mortem examination showed slight facial dysmorphic signs, minor dysgenesis of the ovaries and an atypical outflow of the arteria thyroidea ima. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Split-hand/split-foot malformation with paternal mutation in the p63 gene

We report the prenatal diagnosis at 16 weeks' gestation of bilateral split-hand/split-foot malformation (SHSFM) with severe lobster claw deformity of hands and feet in a male fetus without associated malformations. A minor manifestation of SHSFM was present in the father with only mild bilateral foot involvement (syndactyly I–II; cleft II–III; left cutaneous syndactyly III–IV). Mutation analysis of the p63 gene on chromosome 3q27 showed a missense mutation 577A→G (predicting amino acid substitution K193E) in the father. This mutation has not been reported so far in SHSFM but resembles the previously reported 580A→G (predicting amino acid substitution K194E) in a family with SHSFM. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Orientation ofRhizophagus grandis (Coleoptera: Rhizophagidae) to oxygenated monoterpenes in a species-specific predator-prey relationship

Summary The predator,Rhizophagus grandis, is linked to its specific prey,Dendroctonus micans, by semiochemical signals regulating oviposition and long range orientation. A mixture of simple oxygenated monoterpenes [(–)—fenchone, (–)—pinocamphone, rac. camphor, terpinene-4-ol, borneol, fenchol and verbenone], identified from the frass ofD. micans has been found to be extremely active in a flight windtunnel as a long—range attractant for the predator. The mixture elicited 84 % of the response to larval frass of the prey. Excluding pinocamphone from the mixture did not influence its activity. Also, changing the absolute configurations of some of the components (fenchol, terpinene-4-ol and borneol) did not influence the predators' response. However, the addition of (–)—-terpineol increased the attractivity of the synthetic blend to almost that of larval frass of the prey. Ecological implications of the identified semiochemicals and their use in pest management are discussed.