Tammy E Davies

BirdLife International · Science

Large marine protected areas are increasingly being established to meet global conservation targets and promote sustainable use of resources. Although the factors affecting the performance of small-scale marine protected areas are relatively well studied, there is no such body of knowledge for large marine protected areas. We conducted a global met...

Large marine protected areas (>30,000 km2) have a high profile in marine conservation, yet their contribution to conservation is contested. Assessing the overlap of large marine protected areas with 14,172 species, we found large marine protected areas cover 4.4% of the ocean and at least some portion of the range of 83.3% of the species assessed....

The conservation of migratory marine species, including pelagic seabirds, is challenging because their movements span vast distances frequently beyond national jurisdictions. Here, we aim to identify important aggregations of seabirds in the North Atlantic to inform ongoing regional conservation efforts. Using tracking, phenology, and population da...

Biologging technology is rapidly advancing—scientists are obtaining data on movement and behaviour for a range of species, more accurately than ever before. With this information, it is possible to understand more about important areas and their connections across the open ocean including the high seas, beyond national jurisdictions. But an absence...

The BirdLife Seabird Tracking Database (STDB) was established in 2004 to collate tracking data to address the incidental mortality of seabirds in fisheries and to contribute to identification of sites at sea relevant to establishment of Marine Protected Areas. After 20 years, the STDB has grown to hold ca. 39 million locations for 168 species from...

Biodiversity is critical for maintaining ecosystem function but is threatened by increasing anthropogenic pressures. In the Southern Ocean, a highly biologically productive region containing many endemic species, proactive management is urgently needed to mitigate increasing pressures from fishing, climate change, and tourism. Site‐based conservati...

Species are already on the move as waters warm. Conservation plans need to take this into account

Tropical seabirds exert key roles in reef ecosystems but face growing threats from climate change, especially on coral reef islands (CRIs). Therefore, we advocate for a more comprehensive, global data exchange on CRIs and CRI-dependent seabirds and outline steps for improving their study and conservation.

Maintaining healthy, productive ecosystems in the face of pervasive and accelerating human impacts including climate change requires globally coordinated and sustained observations of marine biodiversity. Global coordination is predicated on an understanding of the scope and capacity of existing monitoring programs, and the extent to which they use...

Identifying important sites for biodiversity is vital for conservation and management. However, there is a lack of accessible, easily applied tools that enable practitioners to delineate important sites for highly mobile species using established criteria. We introduce the R package ‘track2KBA’, a tool to identify important sites at the population...

Anthropogenic climate change is altering the geographical distribution and regular movements of species. Highly‐mobile pelagic seabirds, such as albatrosses, are particularly threatened by human activities, such as fisheries bycatch. Predicting the impact of climate change on how these animals roam the ocean is an important step towards making info...

The identification of geographic areas where the densities of animals are highest across their annual cycles is a crucial step in conservation planning. In marine environments, however, it can be particularly difficult to map the distribution of species, and the methods used are usually biased towards adults, neglecting the distribution of other li...

Addressing the challenge of protecting biodiversity in the global ocean requires a sound knowledge and understanding of the complex marine environment. Since 2008 the Global Ocean Biodiversity Initiative (GOBI) has been established as a voluntary dedicated group of marine institutions and scientists working to support conservation and protection of...

The distributions of migratory species in the ocean span local, national and international jurisdictions. Across these ecologically interconnected regions, migratory marine species interact with anthropogenic stressors throughout their lives. Migratory connectivity, the geographical linking of individuals and populations throughout their migratory...

Systematic conservation planning (SCP) has increasingly been used to prioritize conservation actions, including the design of new protected areas to achieve conservation objectives. Over the last 10 years, the number of marine SCP studies has increased exponentially, yet there is no structured or reliable way to find information on methods, trends,...

Systematic conservation planning (SCP) has increasingly been used to prioritize conservation actions, including the design of new protected areas to achieve conservation objectives. Over the last 10 years, the number of marine SCP studies has increased exponentially, yet there is no structured or reliable way to find information on methods, trends,...

Large marine protected areas (LMPAs) are increasingly being established and have a high profile in marine conservation. LMPAs are expected to achieve multiple objectives, and because of their size are postulated to avoid trade-offs that are common in smaller MPAs. However, evaluations across multiple outcomes are lacking. We used a systematic appro...

The island of Makira in the eastern Solomon Islands is a globally significant priority for bird conservation and, like other islands in Melanesia, its avifauna plays an important role in understanding patterns of biogeography and speciation. Large portions of the island have rarely been visited by ornithologists, however, and published natural hist...

Global drivers of change are affecting marine ecosystems and the people who depend on them at increasing rates and severities. Yet most marine conservation actions were developed before climate change was widely recognized as a major driver of change. In this chapter, we synthesize categories of marine conservation actions and their relevance at lo...

Paleotropical islands are experiencing extensive land-use change, yet little is known about how such changes are impacting wildlife in these biodiversity hot-spots. To address this knowledge gap, we characterized bat responses to forest conversion in a biodiverse, human-threatened coastal rainforest habitat on Makira, Solomon Islands. We analysed ~...

Unprecedented rates of deforestation on tropical islands are threatening high numbers of endemic species, and empirical evidence is needed to better understand the implications of changes in land-use on biodiversity and to guide conservation actions. We assessed the effects of changes in land-use on the lowland avifauna of the tropical island of Ma...

Full paper: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/ZjtQIbuTMasfJJXPqKrm/full Adaptation pathways are increasingly being used as a foresight tool to help guide the implementation of climate change adaptation and deliberate transformation. This paper applies a pathways lens as a hindsight tool to provide new understanding about past change and adaptation...

Pro-poor conservation strategies are touted as a panacea for achieving biodiversity conservation and poverty reduction, yet there remains limited evidence for success in achieving these dual objectives. Is this lack of evidence a sign that the approach is failing or an indicator that we are not capturing appropriate measures of success? In this rev...

There is convergence at the international level that conserving biodiversity can contribute to poverty alleviation, but empirical evidence for this relationship is scarce. In this thesis I assess the relationship between poverty and biodiversity, within the context of land use change, using a case-study from the Solomon Islands. This interdisciplin...

Understanding the local socioeconomic context is important for the design of appropriate conservation initiatives and associated monitoring strategies, especially in areas with high degrees of inequality, to ensure conservation interventions do not inadvertently further disadvantage vulnerable people. Typical assessments of wealth inequality in rem...

Large-scale forest encroachment in Assam, India, has led to increasing levels of human–elephant conflict. Conflict mitigation is a priority for the survival of Asian elephants Elephas maximus throughout Asia. We analysed a 3-year dataset of elephant occurrence and related instances of human–elephant conflict, from two sites in Assam, and explored t...

The raiding of crops by elephants is one of the major components of human-elephant conflict, causing loss of livelihood and retaliation against elephants. To mitigate this conflict, various intervention methods are in use by farm-ers across Africa and Asia; yet there have been few rigorous assessments of their effectiveness. We provide an assessmen...

The raiding of crops by elephants is one of the major components of human-elephant conflict, causing loss of livelihood and retaliation against elephants. To mitigate this conflict, various intervention methods are in use by farm-ers across Africa and Asia; yet there have been few rigorous assessments of their effectiveness. We provide an assessmen...

Abstract  Artisanal fisheries are important socially, nutritionally and economically. Poverty is common in communities dependent on such fisheries, making sustainable management difficult. Poverty based on material style of life (MSL) was assessed, livelihoods surveyed and the relationship between these factors and fishery data collected using a fi...