Jan Christian Habel

University of Salzburg · Biosciences

Land-use change remains the main threat to tropical forests and their dependent fauna and flora, and degradation of existing forest remnants will further accelerate species loss. Forest degradation may result directly from human forest use or through spatial effects of land-use change. Understanding the drivers of forest degradation and its effects...

Successful forest conservation in the tropics depends on various biophysical, socioeconomic, cultural, and political factors. Researchers, environmental practitioners, and local people recognize the need to resolve longstanding systemic weaknesses in environmental governance institutions, to make mainstream environmental policy and action, and to f...

Roadsides, in particular those being species-rich and of conservation value, are considered to improve landscape permeability by providing corridors among habitat patches and by facilitating species' dispersal. However, little is known about the potential connectivity offered by such high-value roadsides. Using circuit theory, we modelled connectiv...

Aims Terrestrial biodiversity is threatened by land use change. Modelling suggests that the remaining, potentially arable areas of natural intact vegetation (rNIV) of 9 of 35 global biodiversity hotspots may be converted to agriculture by 2050, committing their endemic species to extinction. Studies have shown that if the global population adopted...

The amount of carbon stored in deadwood is equivalent to about 8 per cent of the global forest carbon stocks1. The decomposition of deadwood is largely governed by climate2–5 with decomposer groups—such as microorganisms and insects—contributing to variations in the decomposition rates2,6,7. At the global scale, the contribution of insects to the d...

Genetic diversity is of crucial importance for population fitness and the potential of populations to adapt to environmental change. Population-level genetic diversity is expected to be reduced in specialists having small and isolated populations. We analysed genetic structure and diversity in (pre-)Alpine populations of four Copper butterfly speci...

Neogene orogenesis and climatic cycles strongly influenced inter- and intraspecific differentiation and variability of taxa. In this study, we focused on the southern margin of the western Palaearctic, known to be a geographically complex region. We performed mitochondrial DNA analyses of Buthus scorpions from the Moroccan Atlas Mountains, from the...

Drivers of evolution are often related to geographical isolation and/or diverging environmental conditions. Spatial variation in neutral genetic markers mostly reflects past geographical isolation, i.e. long-lasting allopatry, whereas morphology is often driven by local environmental conditions, resulting in more rapid evolution. In Europe, most th...

Species demanding specific habitat requirements suffer, particularly under environmental changes. The smallest owl of Africa, the Sokoke Scops Owl ( Otus ireneae ), occurs exclusively in East African coastal forests. To understand the movement behaviour and habitat demands of O. ireneae , we combined data from radio-tracking and remote sensing to c...

Tropical forests host a remarkable proportion of global arthropod diversity. Yet, arthropod communities living in tropical forests are still poorly studied, particularly for dry forests of Eastern Africa. The aim of this study was to analyse community structures, species richness and relative abundances of insects across a heterogeneous forest cons...

• Reports of major losses in insect biodiversity have stimulated an increasing interest in temporal population changes. Existing datasets are often limited to a small number of study sites, few points in time, a narrow range of land‐use intensities and only some taxonomic groups, or they lack standardised sampling. While new monitoring programs hav...

The success of nature conservation strongly depends on the attitudes and awareness of people, as well as on the level of poverty, land scarcity, communication gaps, and governance structures. In this commentary we elaborate potential effects of inter-community differences on peoples´ attitudes towards nature conservation and the role of land manage...

Reports of major losses in biodiversity have stimulated an increasing interest in temporal population changes, particularly in insects, which had received little attention in the past. Existing long-term datasets are often limited to a small number of study sites, few points in time, a narrow range of land-use intensities and only some taxonomic gr...

A main driver of biodiversity loss is the transformation of pristine habitats into agricultural land, plantations of exotic trees, and settlements. The cloud forest of the Taita Hills in southern Kenya has suffered under such transformation processes. In consequence, remaining forests are small and isolated and often provide degraded forest habitat...

The theory of island biogeography predicts that species diversity is lower on small islands and on islands far distant from the mainland, and higher on large islands with high habitat heterogeneity, and on islands close to the mainland. In addition, population and species persistence (i.e. their long-term survival) depends on life-history traits, i...

Participatory forest management (PFM) is a major approach towards the reconciliation of biodiversity conservation and human livelihood needs. PFM was implemented around the Arabuko-Sokoke Forest (ASF), the largest remaining forest block of the East African coastal forest of southern Kenya, during the early 1990s. While forest cover has remained sta...

Habitat identity and landscape configuration significantly shape species communities and affect ecosystem functions. The conservation of natural ecosystems is of particular relevance in regions where landscapes have already been largely transformed into farmland and where habitats suffer under resource exploitation. The spillover of ecosystem funct...

The number of insect species and insect abundances decreased severely during the past decades over major parts of Central Europe. Previous studies documented declines of species richness, abundances, shifts in species composition, and decreasing biomass of flying insects. In this study, we present a standardized approach to quantitatively and quali...

Habitat destruction and deterioration are amongst the main drivers of biodiversity loss. Increasing demand for agricultural products, timber and charcoal has caused the rapid destruction of natural forests, especially in the tropics. The Taita Hills in southern Kenya are part of the Eastern Afromontane Biodiversity Hotspot and represent a highly di...

The project delved in reconciling human livelihood needs and nature conservation in Kenyan biodiversity hot spots of Nzeu River in Kitui County; The Cloud Forests in Taita Taveta County and the Arabuko Sokoke Forest (ASK) in Kilifi County, Kenya. This was a culmination of a project between the Technical University of Munich and three Kenyan Univers...

Current studies have shown a severe general decline in insect species diversity, their abundance, and a biomass reduction of flying insects. Most of previous studies have been performed at single sites, or were spatially restricted at the landscape level. In this study, we analyse trends of species richness and shifts in species composition of butt...

Agricultural intensification and subsequent landscape homogenisation have caused severe losses of insects across major parts of Europe. In consequence, most animal and plant populations today exist in small and isolated habitat patches. Thus, there is an urgent need to increase landscape permeability to foster the exchange of individuals and thereb...

Recent reports of local extinctions of arthropod species¹, and of massive declines in arthropod biomass², point to land-use intensification as a major driver of decreasing biodiversity. However, to our knowledge, there are no multisite time series of arthropod occurrences across gradients of land-use intensity with which to confirm causal relations...

Effects of anthropogenic activities on habitats and species communities and populations are complex and vary across species depending on their ecological traits. Movement ecology may provide important insights into species’ responses to habitat structures and quality. We investigated how movement behavior across a human‐modified landscape depends o...

Most of Earth's biodiversity is found in 36 biodiversity hotspots, yet less than 10% natural intact vegetation remains. We calculated models projecting the future state of most of these hotspots for the year 2050, based on future climatic and agroeconomic pressure. Our models project an increasing demand for agricultural land resulting in the conve...

Prioritizing species for nature conservation should follow objective ecologically and biogeographically meaningful selection criteria. In this study, we test an approach to prioritize butterfly species for nature conservation considering the following parameters: (1) geographical distribution and endemicity, (2) vulnerability and (3) ecological spe...

Severe decline in terrestrial insect species richness, abundance, flying biomass, and local extinctions across Europe are cause for alarm. Here, we summarize this decline, and identify species affected most. We then focus on the species that might respond best to mitigation measures relative to their traits. We review apparent drivers of decline, a...

Species composition strongly depends on time, place and resources. In this context, semi-natural grasslands belong to the most species-rich habitats of Europe, and succession may eventually cause local extinction of typical grassland species, but conversely increase species richness due to habitat diversification. Here, we analyse potential effects...

Pleistocene glaciations had significant effects on the distribution and evolution of species inhabiting the Holarctic region. Phylogeographic studies concerning the entire region are still rare. Here, we compared global phylogeographic patterns of one boreo-montane and one boreo-temperate butterflies with largely overlapping distribution ranges acr...

Overview of samples of both Boloria eunomia and Boloria selene. Specimens localities; coordinates; COI, ArgKin and Wingless haplotypes, SAMOVA groups and GenBank accession numbers. (XLSX)

MaxEnt. Comparisons of (A) Regularization Multiplier (RM) parameter and (B) different feature classes (FC) of MaxEnt models by ENMeval R package using AICc, used for calculations of Spatial Distribution Models of Boloria eunomia and Boloria selene. The lowest AICc values indicate the best models. (C) Relative gain of the MaxEnt model after removing...

Graphs from SAMOVA analyses. Boloria eunomia cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI; 11 populations) (A); and arginine kinase gene (ArgKin; 3 populations) (B); Boloria selene cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI; 6 populations) (C). K, number of clusters; ΦCT, fixation index. (TIF)

Detailed maps of haplotype diversity of Boloria eunomia within Europe based on COI. Two lineages occurring in the Alps and the Czech Republic (A). Haplotype diversity in north-eastern Europe showing the contact zones in Scandinavia and Poland (B). (TIF)

• Severe losses of insects have taken place over major parts of Europe. This negative trend is assumed to be largely the result of agricultural intensification. • To analyse potential factors causing this loss of species, we assessed butterfly communities at 21 grassland patches. Seventeen of these were distributed across an agricultural landscape...

Background: Spatial isolation, diverging environmental conditions and social structures may lead to the differentiation of various traits, e.g. molecules, morphology and behaviour. Bird calls may provide important information on effects of geographic isolation and may reflect diverging ecological conditions related to altitude. Furthermore, bird c...

Human livelihood needs and nature conservation often contradict. Yet, healthy ecosystems are crucial for human livelihood quality. The semi-arid regions of East Africa suffer under demographic pressure and soil depletion. Ecosystem degradation becomes particularly visible along rivers in semiarid regions of south-east Kenya, where former pristine r...

Habitat demands and species mobility strongly determine the occurrence of species. Sedentary species with specific habitat requirements are assumed to occur more patchy than mobile habitat generalist species, and thus suffer stronger under habitat fragmentation and habitat deterioration. In this study we measured dispersal and habitat preference of...

Dispersal data assessed for each of the three butterfly species. (DOCX)

Mark-release-recapture data of all three butterfly species studied. Given are individuals captured and recaptured per plot and sex of each individual, as well as exact GPS coordinates of each plot. (XLSX)

Different methods to measure species behaviour and space use may produce diverging results, and provide advantages and shortcomings. Data from spot-mapping of animals might be affected from restricted detectability of individuals in dense vegetation, while radio-tracking provides a less biased (or even unbiased) measure of space use. Here we compar...

Habitats related to Transport Infrastructures (HTI) may reduce negative impacts on biodiversity and improve landscape connectivity, given their proper design and construction. Here the transportation sector can contribute to halt the loss of biodiversity and secure ecosystem services in Europe through, planning, construction and management based on...

Anthropogenic activities caused a severe loss of pristine habitats alongside with fragmentation of remaining habitats and the deterioration of habitat quality. The Arabuko Sokoke forest represents the largest remnant of East African coastal forest. Despite conservation efforts to maintain biodiversity in this forest, populations of several species...

Geographical isolation, habitat quality and habitat size are known as driving factors shaping species communities and richness. We analysed cave-dwelling springtail communities from 187 caves of the Carpathian Mountains and the Dobrogea Region across Romania. These caves differ in size, geographical isolation, habitat heterogeneity and age, and in...

Glacial-interglacial cycles of the Quaternary caused severe changes in species distributions across the western Palaearctic. Past barriers changed into suitable habitats, and today's corridors acted as barriers during the past. These changes have driven species diversification. Darkling beetles of the genus Pimelia have undergone a radiation in the...

Anthropogenic disturbances that alter habitat structures can lead to strong changes in species composition. The importance of certain habitat features for structuring species composition, however, may be determined by the availability of resources that can seasonally fluctuate. The Kenyan Arabuko Sokoke coastal forest consists of three pristine for...

Biodiversity is declining, with major causes identified as habitat loss and a reduction of habitat quality. Recent studies have shown that particularly species with specific habitat demands are suffering in this way. Accordingly, habitat specialists have been nominated as umbrella species, which because they represent a much larger number of specie...

The theory of island biogeography predicts the effects of habitat isolation and size on species richness, community assembly, and the persistence of species. Various studies showed that habitat conditions and the ecology of species are also of relevance in explaining community assembly. Geographically isolated habitats like caves with rather consta...

References used for compiling species distribution in caves. (DOCX)

Presence-absence matrix of Collembola in Romanian caves. (XLSX)

Cave characteristics. (XLSX)

Glacial-interglacial cycles of the Quaternary caused severe changes in species distributions across the western Palaearctic. Past barriers changed into suitable habitats, and today's corridors acted as barriers during the past. These changes have driven species diversification. Darkling beetles of the genus Pimelia have undergone a radiation in the...

The postglacial European colonization history has come into the focus of biogeographical interest and the study of phylogenetic relatedness within and between regional faunas and floras has proven to be an effective tool for the reconstruction of postglacial colonization trajectories. In the present study, we used a faunal compilation of 2078 Europ...

Pristine tropical ecosystems are currently suffering under extreme demographic pressure. This has led to habitat destruction and disturbances, an important precondition for the invasion of exotic species into pristine ecosystems, with detrimental effects on biodiversity. In this study, we analysed the chronology of land cover changes along rivers i...

Two major theories of community assembly―based on the assumption of ‘limiting similarity’ or ‘habitat filtering’, respectively―predict contrasting patterns in the spatial arrangement of functional traits. Previous analyses have made progress in testing these predictions and identifying underlying processes, but have also pointed to theoretical as w...

The Arabuko Sokoke dryland coastal forest along the East African coastline provides a unique habitat for many endangered endemic animal and plant species. High demographic pressure with subsequent land-splitting, soil depletion in combination with erratic rainfalls and the collapse of the tourism industry are negatively affecting food security and...

Correction to: Palgrave Communications (2017) 3 Article number: 17032 doi:10.1057/palcomms.2017.32; Published 2 May 2017; Updated 16 May 2017 The article previously lacked some information in the Acknowledgements section. The original text read: Acknowledgements The authors thank all participants for filling out our online questionnaire, and for pe...

The biological sciences have experienced a significant increase in journals and hence in publications in recent decades. The increasing number of research contributions reflects the “publish-or-perish” culture of science. The resulting pressure to publish may affect the publishing and working behaviour of researchers. However, the pressure to publi...

Most studies on tropical conservation questions are conducted by researchers of developed countries from the north. This geographic disconnection was recently criticised by Mammides et al. Here, we reflect on their findings and add further views from scientist’s and journal editor’s perspectives. We argue that journals are, a priori, most strongly...

Context Evidence-based nature conservation focuses on ecological facts and the incorporation of knowledge on the ecology of species, including its entire life cycle. In butterflies, imagos and its larvae often demand specific and diverging micro-habitat structures and resources. In consequence, ecological requirements of the imaginal and pre-imagin...

Rapid fragmentation and degradation of large undisturbed habitats constitute major threats to biodiversity. Several studies have shown that populations in small and highly isolated habitat patches are prone to strong environmental and demographic stochasticity and increased risk of extinction. Based on community assembly theory, we predict recent r...

Location of our study region, the Taita Hills in southern Kenya (map A), and the detailed map of the forest fragments from where bird observations were available (map B), including the following 12 forest patches: Mbololo (1), Ronge (2), Ngangao (3), Vuria (4), Yale (5), Wundanyi (6), Mwachora (7), Macha (8), Kichuchenyi (9), Ndiwenyi (10), Fururu...

Tinamous have male-only parental care. For their mating system, simultaneous polygyny and sequential polyandry is proposed as an optimal model and is confirmed in all species according to the existing literature, except in the Ornate Tinamou. For the Ornate Tinamou a monogamous mating system is reported. However, this knowledge is based only on few...

Aim Genetic and phenotypic data may show convergent or contrasting spatial patterns. Discrepancies between markers may develop in response to different evolutionary forces. In this study we analyse inter‐ and intraspecific differentiation of closely related taxa in the marbled white butterfly species group. Based on genetic and phenotypic character...

Aim. Identification of potential glacial refugia and post-glacial colonization processes of a flightless, cold-adapted ground beetle Location. Central and eastern Europe. Methods. We analysed the genetic structure of 33 Carabus sylvestris popula- tions sampled across its entire distribution range using nuclear and mitochon- drial markers. We furt...

Central European calcareous grasslands are particularly rich in species, harbouring an endangered flora and fauna. In this study, we analyse how invertebrates, like ground beetles, react on vegetation changes in these habitats. We ask if and how species of both groups may react on local environmental changes associated with conservation management...

Effective population size (Ne) is one of the most important parameters in population genetics and conservation biology. It translates census sizes of real populations into the size of an idealized population showing the same rate of loss of genetic diversity as the real populations under study. Several conceptually different types of Ne can be dist...

The white-eye birds of the genus Zosterops have been recognized for their high speciation rates in the past, but the relationships of the East African populations are not yet fully resolved. We sequenced and annotated mitogenomes of four populations currently assigned to three East African white-eye species, Zosterops senegalensis, Z. abyssinicus a...

Tinamous (Tinamidae) represent one of the most ancient living avian lineages but their life history traits are relatively unstudied. Here we identified microsatellite loci for two sympatric tinamou species, the Ornate Tinamou (Nothoprocta ornata) and the Darwin´s Nothura (Nothura darwinii) from low coverage Illumina sequencing of genomic DNA. The e...

Classical Sanger sequencing is still frequently used to generate sequence data for phylogenetic and phylogeographic inference. In this contribution we present a novel approach to genotype whole mitogenomic haplotypes using Illumina MiSeq reads from indexed amplicons. Our new approach reduces preparation time by multiplexing loci within a single or...

The distributions of European high mountain species are often characterised by small and geographically isolated populations and, in many cases, have highly complex biogeographic histories. The butterfly genus Erebia represents one of the best examples for small-scale diversification in the European high mountain systems and therefore to understand...

Currently, there is an increasing need for evidence-based strategies in nature conservation, for example when designing and establishing nature reserves. In this contribution, we critically assess the ecological relevance of recent nature conservation practices in Kenya (East Africa), a region of global biodiversity hotspots. More specifically, we...

Riparian thickets of East Africa harbor a large number of endemic animal and plant species, but also provide important ecosystem services for the human being settling along streams. This creates a conflicting situation between nature conservation and land-use activities. Today, most of this former pristine vegetation is highly degraded and became r...

Figure S1. Home range area (in ha) per individual against sample size (days after start of data acquisition), shown for (a) Minimum Convex Polygon estimator using 95% of the relocations (MCP95) in August 2014; (b) Kernel home ranges for 95% levels (K95) in August 2014, (c) MCP95 in February/ March 2015, and (d) K95 in February/ March 2015.