ArticlePDF Available

The fall of the wild

Authors:
David P Mallon at Manchester Metropolitan University
David P Mallon
Mark Stanley Price at University of Oxford
Mark Stanley Price
Download full-text PDF
Read full-text
Download citation
Content uploaded by Mark Stanley Price
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Mark Stanley Price on Nov 28, 2016
Content may be subject to copyright.
The fall of the wild
DAVID P. MALLON and M ARK R. STANLEY PRICE
One long-term vision for species could be that they persist
in viable numbers in representative parts of their indigenous
ranges in dynamic and resilient ecosystems over spatial and
temporal scales that allow natural selection to take place.
Most people would call such populations wild. But with
the challenges that biodiversity faces from habitat loss
and fragmentation, overuse, pollution and disease, and with
threats acting synergistically, how many populations can we
really call ‘wild’? When does human intervention in the
form of habitat manipulation or population support or
control render a population no longer wild?
Although wild may be instinctively interpreted as the
opposite of tame or managed these states represent the
ends of a continuum, and drawing a line between them
is not straightforward. The need to define what is wild and
non-wild is not just a theoretical issue but one that has
practical implications for, inter alia, international agree-
ments (Convention on Biological Diversity, CITES,
Convention on Migratory Species), national legislation,
lists of protected species and the IUCN Red List, all of which
relate to wild species. None of these, however, provide
adefinition; for example, the current IUCN Red List
guidelines state that the process should be applied to wild
populations but without defining what constitutes ‘wild’
(IUCN Standards and Petitions Subcommittee, 2013).
Redford et al. (2011)defined the spectrum of manage-
ment support for securing threatened vertebrate popu-
lations. They proposed five steps to cover the full range
of level and type of human intervention in management
(self-sustaining, conservation dependent, lightly managed,
intensively managed and captive breeding) but did not
explicitly distinguish within this typology between wild and
non-wild.
Interventions take many forms: habitat creation or
manipulation, provision of supplementary food and salt
licks, creation of artificial water points, provision of shelter
(nest boxes for birds, bat boxes and roosts), predator
control, population reinforcement, reintroduction, veter-
inary measures, and fencing to keep species in or out of
an area.
Given the extent of human intervention in biodiversity
conservation, excluding any management effort from
consideration of what is wild is impractical as it would
render many populations and species non-wild. The
dividing line would appear most logically placed between
lightly and intensively managed (sensu Redford et al.,
2011) and the type of, and degree of dependence on,
the management intervention assessed on a case-by case
basis—resulting perhaps in a somewhat fuzzy line rather
than a precise definition with universal applicability.
Vultures in south and south-east Asia have been
provided with clean carcases free of toxins, such as
diclofenac, at vulture restaurants; are vultures in those
areas mainly or wholly dependent on this food thereby
non-wild? Are bird populations heavily dependent on
winter food at garden bird tables wild? Does living in
gardens and orchards count as being in the wild? Wherever
the theoretical line between wild and non-wild is drawn, as
the numbers and distributions of many species shrink and
become more fragmented there is an undeniable trend for
many of those remaining to receive increasing levels of
management intervention and thus become less wild.
Fragmentation as a result of anthropogenic activities is
exacerbated by confinement within fenced areas to protect
from overharvesting and encroachment, further hindering
movement of individuals—and genetic exchange—between
subpopulations. Most cheetahs and wild dogs in South
Africa will be dependent in the long term on movement of
individuals between small subpopulations in fenced areas.
Management becomes more intensive (e.g. culling to
control numbers) when the ecosystem remnants become so
small they are no longer self-regulating: increasing rarity
means more species need specific conservation interven-
tions. Measures are intensified when rare species acquire
great commercial value: thus rhinos increasingly need
military-quality protection measures, with fenced sanctu-
aries being developed both outside and inside African
protected areas. Even if rhinos carry on their normal habits
inside the fenced area, do these measures mean they are no
longer wild?
There is a parallel with changes in the concept of
naturalness. Landscape scale intervention began when early
humans used fire and tools to modify the habitats in which
they lived, and developed further with the domestication
of wild animals and cultivation of crops. As Pearce (2013)
has shown, a fifth of the land across the world had been
transformed by humans as early as 5,000 years ago—a
proportion that past studies of historical land use had
assumed was only reached in the past 100 years or so. Much
primary tropical rain forest is now seen to be secondary
DAVID P. MALLON 3 Acre Street, Glossop, Derbyshire, SK13 8JS, UK. E-mail
dmallon7@gmail.com
MARK R. STANLEY PRICE Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, Department of
Zoology, University of Oxford, The Recanati-Kaplan Centre, Tubney, UK
©2013 Fauna & Flora International,
Oryx
, 47(4), 467–468 doi:10.1017/S003060531300121X
growth, and the supposedly pristine Amazon basin shows
signs of historical civilisations that collapsed and whose
infrastructures have been reclaimed by forest, and are barely
detectable.
Visitors become accustomed to parks where wildlife
viewing is good, encouraging managers to favour popular
species and manage habitat to promote them. Thus
managed habitats and animal communities become the
norm and expectations of wildness changes. A shifting
baseline between generations is real: what a parental
generation grew up knowing as common is often now rare
and this will influence the next generation. Will this
situation spread globally as the world’s population aspires
to consumerist lifestyles in which exposure to nature is
second hand, through increasingly brilliant media pro-
ductions (Pyle, 2003)?
A prevalent myth in the UK is the perception of
intensively farmed lands as good wildlife habitat. A walk
around southern English farmland shows it to be an almost
green desert for native wildlife. Perhaps appreciation of this
situation is behind the RSPB’s current editorial statement,
which states ‘. . .nature needs a home. At all scales, from your
back garden, local park or school grounds to our expansive
and most iconic landscapes, nature thrives if it has a safe
place to live’(Clarke, 2013). But will nature be wild in most
of these settings?
Does this diminution of wildness matter and, if so,
can anything be done about it? There are also cultural
differences to consider: in many countries ‘wild’means
‘primitive’and hence an embarrassing liability and/or
economically useless, and thus wild lands are prime targets
for land-use conversion. Large areas of national parks in
Ethiopia are being degazetted for commercial sugar cane,
and for someone faced with the real risk of serious injury or
death by a wild animal, or whose livelihood is threatened by
damage from large carnivores or herbivores, the notion and
desirability of ‘wildness’may be different.
We started to think about the issue of wildness based
on the case of the Arabian oryx Oryx leucoryx. Extinct in
the wild in early 1970s, it has been reintroduced to five
countries and eight sites, and was downlisted in 2011 to
Vulnerable based on increased numbers (IUCN SSC
Antelope Specialist Group, 2011). This reassessment pro-
voked critical comment on the grounds that most of the
animals are inside fenced enclosures and are too confined
and too managed to count as wild, and should therefore
not have been used for assessment. But two reserves
with reintroduced oryx—Mahazat as-Sayd in Saudi Arabia
and Umm al Zumoul in the UAE—cover 2,200 and
10,000 km
2
respectively, areas that exceed those of some
protected areas, and many ranches, game farms and
conservancies in southern Africa. Considering animals in
such southern African sites as non-wild would result
in massive changes to the Red List and render some species
ineligible for assessment. Confinement alone is thus not a
useful determinant of wildness although clearly the space
available per individual is key—determining the likelihood
of self-sufficiency in its essential requirements.
We may be losing the wild as more sites, communities
and populations of plants and animals and fungi receive
direct or indirect interventions, intended or unintended. But
does this matter? We live in an age of profound ecological
change and surprise. Climate change is only starting to be
treated as not just another threat but an overarching one
that will interact with other threats. Will populations that
have been relocated to where we think conditions will be
more suited to them under changed climate regimes be
considered wild?
Such assisted colonization for single species is only the
beginning. So-called re-wilding is currently attracting great
attention but any European efforts will inevitably be pale
facsimiles, at best, of Pleistocene communities. The notion
of novel climates requiring novel or designer ecosystems is
gaining traction (Hobbs et al., 2013): can their populations
be wild? Rather further from current conservation is
synthetic biology: will new, man-made species or those
restored from pre-extinction DNA ever be seen as wild?
We have a conundrum: very little wilderness is
untouched in some way by human influence, and more
plants and animals are affected than we probably wish to
concede. Should we drop the notion of wild except for very
rigorously defined circumstances, or continue believing
quaintly that wild is a noble, albeit increasingly unrealistic
ideal?
References
CLARKE,M.(2013) Giving nature a home. Birds Magazine, Royal
Society for the Protection of Birds, Autumn 2013.
HOBBS, R.J., HIGGS, E.S. & HALL, C.M. (eds) (2013)Novel Ecosystems:
Intervening in the New Ecological World Order. John Wiley and
Sons, London, UK.
IUCN SSC ANTELOPE SPECIALIST GROUP (2011)Oryx leucoryx.
In IUCN Red List of Threatened Species v. 2013.1.Http://www.
iucnredlist.org [accessed 30 July 2013].
IUCN STANDAR DS AND PETITIONS SUBCOMMITTEE (2013)
Guidelines for Using the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria.
Version 10. Prepared by the Standards and Petitions Subcommittee.
Http://www.iucnredlist.org/documents/RedListGuidelines.pdf
[accesssed 3September 2013].
PEARCE,F.(2013) True nature: revising ideas on what is pristine
and wild. Environment 360.Http://e360.yale.edu/feature/
true_nature_revising_ideas_on_what_is_pristine_and_wild/2649
[accesssed 3September 2013].
PYLE, R.M. (2003) Nature matrix: reconnecting people and nature.
Oryx,37,206–214.
REDFORD, K.H., AMATO, G., B AILLIE, J., B ELDOMENICO,P.,
BENNETT, E.L., CLUM, N. et al. (2011) What does it mean to
successfully conserve a (vertebrate) species? BioScience,61,39–48.
468 David P. Mallon and Mark R. Stanley Price
©2013 Fauna & Flora International,
Oryx
, 47(4), 467–468
... Wallach et al., 2018;Hayward et al., 2019), (ii) keeping threatened species in captivity such as in zoos and wildlife parks, which some people also consider unethical (Keulartz, 2015) and (iii) fencing the feral animals out of large areas of threatened species habitat. Containing feral animals within high protective fencing can be perceived as reducing their 'wildness' (Mallon and Price, 2013;Child et al., 2019) and is also debated. ...
... Surprisingly, the WTP for 'killing feral animals' was positive for all species except the cod and the snail with little variation and no negative confidence intervals. This result was surprising given the level of public debate about all of the strategies for reducing the effects of feral species (Wallach et al., 2018;Hayward et al., 2019;Keulartz, 2015;Mallon and Price, 2013;Child et al., 2019). One reason why killing feral animals was valued so highly may be because respondents appreciate co-benefits from such a strategy for other threatened species, or more broadly across society, as demonstrated for cats (Legge et al., 2020). ...
How public values for threatened species are affected by conservation strategies
Article
  • Oct 2022
  • J ENVIRON MANAGE
While the imminent extinction of many species is predicted, prevention is expensive, and decision-makers often have to prioritise funding. In democracies, it can be argued that conservation using public funds should be influenced by the values placed on threatened species by the public, and that community views should also affect the conservation management approaches adopted. We conducted on online survey with 2400 respondents from the general Australian public to determine 1) the relative values placed on a diverse set of 12 threatened Australian animal species and 2) whether those values changed with the approach proposed to conserve them. The survey included a contingent valuation and a choice experiment. Three notable findings emerged: 1) respondents were willing to pay 60/yearonaverageforaspecies(9560/year on average for a species (95% confidence interval: 23 to 105)toavoidextinctioninthenext20yearsbasedonthecontingentvaluation,and105) to avoid extinction in the next 20 years based on the contingent valuation, and 29 to $100 based on the choice experiment, 2) respondents were willing to pay to reduce the impact of feral animals on almost all presented threatened species, 3) for few species and respondents, WTP was lower when genetic modification to reduce inbreeding in the remaining population was proposed.
View
... For scientists, debates about ethics are conducted through professional communication channels. For example, in the last decade, scientists have debated the ethics of killing feral animals to help threatened species (Olszańska et al., 2016;Wallach et al., 2018;Hayward et al., 2019), containing them within protective fencing (Mallon and Price, 2013;Child et al., 2019), taking threatened species into captivity (Jamieson, 1995;Keulartz, 2015), mixing previously separated populations (Edmands, 2007;Frankham et al., 2011), deliberate hybridization (Todesco et al., 2016;Quilodrán et al., 2020), assisted migration (Albrecht et al., 2013;Ahteensuu and Lehvävirta, 2014), and applying genetic engineering and gene drives to conservation (Piaggio et al., 2017;Kirk et al., 2020;Sandler, 2020) among other issues. However, expert opinion should be just one aspect of the decision-making process. ...
... We assessed preferences for nine conservation interventions (Table 1) following a review of the literature about feasible and innovative conservation strategies currently being applied or proposed in Australia (Jamieson, 1995;Edmands, 2007;Frankham et al., 2011;Albrecht et al., 2013;Mallon and Price, 2013;Ahteensuu and Lehvävirta, 2014;Keulartz, 2015;Olszańska et al., 2016;Todesco et al., 2016;Piaggio et al., 2017;Wallach et al., 2018;Child et al., 2019;Hayward et al., 2019;Kirk et al., 2020;Quilodrán et al., 2020;Sandler, 2020). These interventions fell into two approachesinvasive species control and genetic management. ...
Measuring social preferences for conservation management in Australia
Article
  • Sep 2021
  • BIOL CONSERV
Conservation management is a rapidly evolving field in which scientific innovation and management practice can run ahead of social acceptability, leading to dispute and policy constraints. Here we use best-worst scaling (BWS) to explore the social preferences for two broad areas of threatened species management in Australia as well as support for extinction prevention as a whole. Of the 2430 respondents to an online survey among the Australian general public, 70% stated that extinction should be prevented regardless of the cost, a sentiment not fully reflected in existing policy and legislation. There was strong support for existing measures being taken to protect threatened species from feral animals, including explicit support for the killing of feral animals, but the demographic correlations with the results suggest approval is lower among women and younger respondents. There was a particularly high level of support for moving species to new places, which does not match current capabilities of managers responsible for assisted migration, suggesting messaging about the current limitations needs to be improved, or for resources to overcome them greatly increased. There was less support for genetic interventions than the feral animal control and other land management measures. A small majority of respondents thought it would be better for a species to cope without assistance than invasively alter their genome. This suggests that greater community consultation is desirable before applying genetic management approaches more interventionist than interbreeding subspecies.
View
... Comme ces processus dépendent de la biodiversité des agroécosystèmes, la transition vers l'agroécologie nécessite d'accroître la biodiversité au sein de la ferme, en particulier celle qui soutient la production agricole, et de la gérer à une échelle paysagère (Duru et al., 2015). Traditionnellement, la conservation et la restauration de la biodiversité impliquent souvent une intervention humaine continue, comme la création ou la manipulation d'habitats, l'élimination d'espèces envahissantes ou des programmes de conservation animale ex situ, même dans les zones naturelles (Mallon & Price, 2013). Dans les zones agricoles, notamment en Europe, les programmes agro-environnementaux reposent sur la promotion d'interventions donnant lieu à une biodiversité plus importante et fournissant davantage de services écosystémiques que sans ces interventions (Batáry et al., 2015). ...
Au-delà de l’agroécologie : le ré-ensauvagement agricole, une perspective pour les systèmes d’élevage ?
Article
Full-text available
  • Oct 2023
La conservation et la restauration de la biodiversité impliquent généralement des interventions humaines. En comparaison, le ré-ensauvagement est une approche radicalement différente qui propose de s’appuyer sur les processus écologiques spontanés pour restaurer les écosystèmes. Le ré-ensauvagement, y compris celui des systèmes agricoles, a été examiné d’un point de vue écologique et social, mais peu d’un point de vue agricole. Dans cette revue de la littérature et d’études de cas, nous i) analysons si et comment le ré-ensauvagement des systèmes d’élevage peut contribuer à conserver et restaurer la biodiversité et offrir de nouvelles perspectives, principalement en Europe, et ii) identifions des questions de recherche sur le ré-ensauvagement des systèmes agricoles. Nous avons recherché la littérature portant à la fois sur le ré-ensauvagement et l’agriculture. Nous avons également identifié des projets de ré-ensauvagement agricole établis depuis au moins cinq ans au Royaume-Uni afin d’analyser leurs approches et leurs caractéristiques. Le ré-ensauvagement agricole est une forme émergente d’utilisation des terres que nous positionnons conceptuellement entre l’agroécologie et le ré-ensauvagement. Il combine la restauration des processus écologiques avec un certain degré de production agricole, le plus souvent d’herbivores. Une sélection de 11 projets de ré-ensauvagement agricole au Royaume-Uni portait sur des surfaces allant de 121 à 4 402 ha. Les principales actions visant à favoriser le ré-ensauvagement étaient le pâturage extensif et la restauration d’habitats. Les principales activités économiques étaient la vente d’animaux, le tourisme et l’éducation. Le ré-ensauvagement agricole peut constituer un modèle multifonctionnel vers lequel les systèmes d’élevage herbivore peuvent évoluer pour mieux répondre aux préoccupations environnementales.
View
... Not all conservation measures that can be applied are necessarily acceptable to the broader public which, either through taxes or donations, pays for them. Scientists have debated, for example, the ethics of managing feral animals harmful to threatened species by either killing them (Wallach et al. 2018, Hayward et al. 2019 or containing the threatened species within protective fencing (Mallon & Price 2013, Child et al. 2019. Other ethical debates have been around taking threatened species into captivity, such as wildlife parks or zoos (Keulartz 2015), and relocating them somewhere safer (referred to as assisted migration; Albrecht et al. 2013, Ahteensuu & Lehvävirta 2014. ...
The Australian public worries more about losing species than the costs of keeping them
Article
Full-text available
  • Mar 2023
  • ENVIRON CONSERV
Government conservation measures will always depend on public support. While more has been learnt about which species the public values and which conservation measures are socially acceptable, less is known about the criteria that the public thinks government should consider when making conservation investment decisions. This study uses a stated preference best–worst scaling method to gauge the views of a sample of the Australian public on what they think government should consider when allocating funding to threatened species conservation. We found that the three most important factors were the risk that a species might become extinct, the likelihood that a conservation intervention might be effective and the risk of unintended consequences for other species that could potentially arise if the measure was implemented. Costs of conservation measures and the degree to which the society accepts these costs were considered much less important. The latter aspect was consistent with the high level of trust that respondents placed in the judgement of experts and scientists concerning threatened species conservation. We conclude that the Australian Government has a societal mandate to spend more money on threatened species conservation, provided that there is little risk and that it is backed up by science.
View
... As these processes depend on the biodiversity in agroecosystems, transitioning to agroecology requires increasing on-farm biodiversity, especially that which supports agricultural production, and managing it with a landscape approach (Duru et al., 2015). Traditional biodiversity conservation and restoration often involve continued human intervention, such as habitat creation or manipulation, culling of invasive species or captive-breeding programs, even in natural areas (Mallon and Price, 2013). In agricultural areas, especially in Europe, agri-environment programmes are based on the observation that certain forms of intervention can yield higher biodiversity and supplies of certain ecosystem services than areas without these interventions (Batáry et al., 2015). ...
Beyond agroecology: Agricultural rewilding, a prospect for livestock systems
Article
Full-text available
  • May 2022
  • AGR SYST
CONTEXT Agricultural intensification is a major cause of biodiversity loss. Biodiversity conservation and restoration generally involve human intervention. In comparison, rewilding, a radically different approach to address the erosion of biodiversity, aims to increase the ability of ecological processes to act with little or no human intervention, and thus to enhance biodiversity and the supply of ecosystem services. Rewilding, including that of agricultural systems, has been examined from ecological and social perspectives but rarely from an agricultural perspective. OBJECTIVE In this review of the literature and case studies, we (i) analyse whether and how rewilding of agricultural systems, particularly livestock systems, can help conserve and restore biodiversity and offer new prospects, and (ii) identify research questions about rewilding of agricultural systems. METHODS We researched literature in the Web of Science Core Collection that focussed on rewilding, agriculture, and interactions between them. We also identified agricultural rewilding projects established for at least five years in the United Kingdom (UK) to analyse their approaches and characteristics. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS Agricultural rewilding is an emerging form of land use that we conceptually position on a gradient between agroecology and rewilding. It combines restoration of ecological processes with some degree of agricultural production, most often of herbivores. A selection of 11 agricultural rewilding projects in the UK had areas of 121–4402 ha. The projects targeted 48 key species/breeds, 24 of which were ecosystem engineers: 19 grazers, four pig breeds and Eurasian beavers. The main actions to enhance rewilding were extensive grazing and habitat restoration. The main economic activities were meat or animal sales, tourism and education programmes. Agricultural rewilding may provide a multifunctional model to which livestock systems with herbivores may transition to respond better to environmental concerns. However, because it may lack economic viability and conflict with local culture and traditions, government policies may be needed to encourage more farmers to adopt it. SIGNIFICANCE Agricultural rewilding offers new prospects for livestock systems with herbivores. We identified key research questions about its relation to agroecology and rewilding, conditions necessary to implement it, its potential for plant production and its value for farmers. In addition, the forms it can take remain to be explored, and the potential influence of these forms on biodiversity, ecosystem services and environmental impacts needs to be characterised. Exploring the forms that agricultural rewilding may take requires close collaboration among ecologists, animal scientists, agronomists, and social scientists.
View
... The historical range of this medium-sized, desert-dwelling antelope covered the Arabian Peninsula and as far north as Syria (Harrison & Bates 1991). The species now occurs in a few reintroduced populations and many semi-captive populations in the Arabian Peninsula with substantially improved conservation status; yet most of the sites included in the 2011 assessment have had to be fenced (Mallon & Price 2013), including our study site, the Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve (DDCR) in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). ...
Zoometric data extraction from drone imagery: the Arabian oryx (Oryx leucoryx)
Article
Full-text available
  • Jun 2021
  • ENVIRON CONSERV
Data extraction from unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) imagery has proved effective in animal surveys and monitoring, but to date, it has scarcely been used for detailed population analysis and individual animal feature extraction. We assessed the zoometric and feature extraction of Arabian oryx (Oryx leucoryx) using data acquired from a captive population for comparison with reintroduced populations monitored by UAVs. Highly accurate scaled and geo-rectified imagery derived from UAV surveys allowed precise morphometric measurements of the oryx. The scaled top view imagery, combined with baseline data from known sex, age, weight, and pregnancy status of captive individuals, were used to develop predictive models. A bracketed index developed from the predictive models showed high accuracy for classifying the age group ≤ 16 months, animals with a weight >80 kg, and pregnancy. The pregnancy classification decision tree model performed with a 91.7% accuracy. The polynomial weight predictive model performed well with relatively high accuracy when using the total top view surface measurement. Photogrammetrically processed UAV acquired imagery can yield valuable zoometric data feature extraction and modelling; it is a tool with a practical application for field biologists that can assist in the decision-making process for species conservation management.
View
... Politics (Arts, Fischer, & Wal, 2012;Manning et al., 2009) Species reintroductions may also be political decisions and imply governance issues at different scales Values (Gray, Brockington, Hayward, & Walmsley., 2016;Mallon & Stanley Price, 2013;O'Rourke, 2014) The conflicts or debates about a species reintroduction may stem from different values and different views on nature, the landscapes, the wild ...
Conflicts over wildlife conservation: Learning from the reintroduction of beavers in Scotland
Article
Full-text available
  • Mar 2020
Species reintroductions have become a common conservation tool, but they can be controversial and may generate social conflicts. We examine the social dimension of beaver reintroduction in Scotland to understand the issue, the potential for, and impact of, conflict between groups or individuals with differing views on beavers and reintroductions. Using a literature review and semi‐structured interviews, we studied planned and unplanned beaver reintroductions to three contrasting landscapes in Scotland: in Knapdale, the reintroduction was planned and science‐led, whereas in Tayside and the Highlands, the reintroductions were accidental and/or illegal. Our results highlight the context dependency and complexity of reintroductions. Nationally, the reintroduction of beavers has not become a conflict. At the local scale, we found the Tayside situation to be a conflict with major consequences on the debate at the national scale. While there were no conflicts in the Highlands and Knapdale, the reintroduction remains controversial. The level of conflict depended on the reintroduction process, relationships between stakeholders and their perspectives on their role in nature, their perceptions of landscapes, and the potential issue of lack of control and uncertainty around reintroductions. Based on these findings, the study outlines lessons learned in terms of management, guidelines and implications for future species reintroductions. We argue that to prevent future conflicts over reintroductions, processes must go beyond addressing the effects of reintroduced species on the environment and people's perceptions and acceptance of these species. Reintroduction processes require engagement in effective discussions which involve all actual and potential stakeholders to agree on broad and long‐term conservation plans at the landscape scale. A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article.
View
... Wildness as they define it is an unobservable (i.e., latent) variable and therefore hard to validate. Their framework builds on previous frameworks, including work by Aplet et al. (2000) and Mallon and Stanley Price (2013) and most notably on Redford et al. (2011). Child et al. suggest refinements to the previous frameworks are needed because the attributes of Redford et al. (2011) are qualitative and not based on species-specific measurable thresholds that allow objective distinction between states and because they apply to species and not to local populationswhich is the unit of most management. ...
Need for transparent and repeatable conservation frameworks: reply to Child et al. 2019
Article
Full-text available
Article impact statement: Without consideration of the validity of conservation frameworks and models to assist managers, efforts of conservation scientists are wasted.
View
... Behavioural ecologists have a crucial contribution to make here! The growing acceptance of anthropogenic change to the natural environment as inevitable brings us into a grey zone where it is critical that we are fully aware of how ecological systems, shaped by evolution, are being modified, and it raises serious questions about exactly what it is that we are trying to preserve: how do we define concepts such as species integrity, and what do we require for natural systems to be considered 'wild' [39]? As the ultimate goal of conservation is to preserve natural ecological and evolutionary processes, behavioural ecology-with its emphasis on both the process of adaptation and purely ecological responses-can provide vital insights. ...
Linking behaviour to dynamics of populations and communities : Application of novel approaches in behavioural ecology to conservation
Article
Full-text available
  • Jul 2019
The impact of environmental change on the reproduction and survival of wildlife is often behaviourally mediated, placing behavioural ecology in a central position to quantify population- and community-level consequences of anthropogenic threats to biodiversity. This theme issue demonstrates how recent conceptual and methodological advances in the discipline are applied to inform conservation. The issue highlights how the focus in behavioural ecology on understanding variation in behaviour between individuals, rather than just measuring the population mean, is critical to explaining demographic stochasticity and thereby reducing fuzziness of population models. The contributions also show the importance of knowing the mechanisms by which behaviour is achieved, i.e. the role of learning, reasoning and instincts, in order to understand how behaviours change in human-modified environments, where their function is less likely to be adaptive. More recent work has thus abandoned the 'adaptationist' paradigm of early behavioural ecology and increasingly measures evolutionary processes directly by quantifying selection gradients and phenotypic plasticity. To support quantitative predictions at the population and community levels, a rich arsenal of modelling techniques has developed, and interdisciplinary approaches show promising prospects for predicting the effectiveness of alternative management options, with the social sciences, movement ecology and epidemiology particularly pertinent. The theme issue furthermore explores the relevance of behaviour for global threat assessment, and practical advice is given as to how behavioural ecologists can augment their conservation impact by carefully selecting and promoting their study systems, and increasing their engagement with local communities, natural resource managers and policy-makers. Its aim to uncover the nuts and bolts of how natural systems work positions behavioural ecology squarely in the heart of conservation biology, where its perspective offers an all-important complement to more descriptive 'big-picture' approaches to priority setting. This article is part of the theme issue 'Linking behaviour to dynamics of populations and communities: application of novel approaches in behavioural ecology to conservation'.
View
Agricultural rewilding: a prospect for livestock systems
Preprint
Full-text available
  • Sep 2021
CONTEXT: Agricultural intensification is a major cause of biodiversity loss. Biodiversity conservation and restoration generally involve human intervention. In comparison, rewilding, a radically different approach to address the erosion of biodiversity, aims to increase the ability of ecological processes to act with little or no human intervention, and thus to enhance biodiversity and the supply of ecosystem services. OBJECTIVE: In this review and call to explore the potential of rewilding for agriculture, in particular for livestock systems, we identified effects of agroecological livestock systems on biodiversity and analysed similarities, differences and complementarities between the agroecological transition and the rewilding of livestock systems.METHODS: We researched literature in the Web of Science Core Collection that focussed on biodiversity, livestock, agriculture, rewilding and interactions among them.RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: Agricultural rewilding is an emerging form of land use that we conceptually position between agroecology and rewilding. It combines restoration of ecological processes with some degree of agricultural production, most often of animals. Over time, human land-use has aimed to increase plant and animal output, which has degraded the ecological integrity of ecosystems. This process of dewilding accelerated with the advent of agriculture. In recent decades, certain agricultural landscapes and farms have evolved in the opposite direction, decreasing material human inputs and improving ecological integrity. This evolution takes three forms: agroecological transition, agricultural rewilding and rewilding. Of these, the first and third concern relatively large areas. A selection of 11 agricultural rewilding projects established for at least 5 years in the United Kingdom had areas of 121-4402 ha. The projects targeted 48 key species/breeds, 23 of which were ecosystem engineers: 18 grazers, 4 pig breeds and beavers. The main actions to enhance rewilding were extensive grazing and habitat restoration. The main economic activities were meat or animal sales, tourism and education programmes. Agricultural rewilding may provide a multifunctional model to which livestock farms may transition to respond better to societal demands.SIGNIFICANCE: Agricultural rewilding offers a new and inspiring prospect for livestock systems and poses research questions about its relation to agroecology and rewilding, its implementation, its potential for plant production and its value for livestock farmers. The forms it can take remain to be explored, and the potential influence of these forms on biodiversity, ecosystem services and environmental impacts needs to be characterised. Exploring the forms that agricultural rewilding may take requires close collaboration among ecologists, animal scientists and agronomists.
View
What Does It Mean to Successfully Conserve a (Vertebrate) Species?
Article
Full-text available
  • Feb 2011
The conservation of species is one of the foundations of conservation biology. Successful species conservation has often been defined as simply the avoidance of extinction. We argue that this focus, although important, amounts to practicing conservation at the “emergency room door,” and will never be a sufficient approach to conserving species. Instead, we elaborate a positive definition of species conservation on the basis of six attributes and propose a categorization of different states of species conservation using the extent of human management and the degree to which each of the attributes is conserved. These states can be used to develop a taxonomy of species “recovery” that acknowledges there are multiple stable points defined by ecological and social factors. “With this approach, we hope to contribute to a new, optimistic conservation biology that is not based on underambitious goals and that seeks to create the conditions under which Earth's biological systems can thrive.
View
Novel Ecosystems: Intervening in the New Ecological World Order
Book
  • Jan 2013
Land conversion, climate change and species invasions are contributing to the widespread emergence of novel ecosystems, which demand a shift in how we think about traditional approaches to conservation, restoration and environmental management. They are novel because they exist without historical precedents and are self-sustaining. Traditional approaches emphasizing native species and historical continuity are challenged by novel ecosystems that deliver critical ecosystems services or are simply immune to practical restorative efforts. Some fear that, by raising the issue of novel ecosystems, we are simply paving the way for a more laissez-faire attitude to conservation and restoration. Regardless of the range of views and perceptions about novel ecosystems, their existence is becoming ever more obvious and prevalent in today's rapidly changing world. In this first comprehensive volume to look at the ecological, social, cultural, ethical and policy dimensions of novel ecosystems, the authors argue these altered systems are overdue for careful analysis and that we need to figure out how to intervene in them responsibly. This book brings together researchers from a range of disciplines together with practitioners and policy makers to explore the questions surrounding novel ecosystems. It includes chapters on key concepts and methodologies for deciding when and how to intervene in systems, as well as a rich collection of case studies and perspective pieces. It will be a valuable resource for researchers, managers and policy makers interested in the question of how humanity manages and restores ecosystems in a rapidly changing world.
View
Novel Ecosystems: Intervening in the New Ecological World Order
Chapter
  • Jan 2013
This conclusory chapter of Novel Ecosystems: Intervening in the New Ecological World Order reflects on some of the ongoing points of discussion and key themes emerging in the book. It offers a few last thoughts on how we start to apply these ideas to intervening in a new ecological world order. The chapters, case studies and perspectives in this book offer a basis for constructive discussion of the issues and some clues for ways forward in dealing with them. The common perspectives prevalent in the book allow a move beyond simply debating what novel ecosystems are to considering how we might effectively intervene in such systems, within the broader context of ecosystem management and policy.
View
Nature Matrix: Reconnecting People and Nature
Article
  • Apr 2003
  • ORYX
Many individuals and societies are no longer connected to the more-than-human world in such a way as to ensure a sustainable future. As such connection has diminished, environmental challenges have multiplied and influences for estrangement intensified. I review the importance of direct, intimate encounter with places and organisms on the attitudes of the young, as well as the significance of biophilia. The result of the loss of contact and subsequent alienation is the Extinction of Experience: an inexorable cycle of disconnection, apathy, and progressive depletion. I describe an effort to demonstrate this effect. Small, humble habitats, especially in urban settings, can be as important as big reserves in awakening biophilia. Biophobia, abetted by the loss of such habitats, the rise of the virtual in place of actual experience, economic inequalities, and overpopulation, further feeds the downward spiral of extinction and disaffection. The climate of global corporate growth that now prevails is inimical to sustainability, as is the current state of ecological illiteracy. Radical change is therefore necessary to address both economic disparity, in the direction of minimal ownership rather than maximum consumerism, and educational reform that places nature at the centre rather than the margin of the curriculum. I present a six-point programme, called Nature Matrix, for an alternative social and ethical paradigm. Rather than a pragmatic plan for the near future, Nature Matrix is a model for essential, incremental change, a dream whose eventual adoption may enhance chances for reconnection and for ecological survival itself: at present, a deeply uncertain prospect.
View
Giving nature a home. Birds Magazine
  • Jan 2013
CLARKE, M. (2013) Giving nature a home. Birds Magazine, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Autumn 2013.
Guidelines for Using the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria. Version 10. Prepared by the Standards and Petitions Subcommittee
  • Iucn Standards
  • Petitions Subcommittee
IUCN STANDARDS A N D PETITIONS SUBCOMMITTEE (2013) Guidelines for Using the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria. Version 10. Prepared by the Standards and Petitions Subcommittee. Http://www.iucnredlist.org/documents/RedListGuidelines.pdf [accesssed 3 September 2013].
Giving nature a home. Birds Magazine, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds
  • Jan 2013
  • M Clarke
CLARKE, M. (2013) Giving nature a home. Birds Magazine, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Autumn 2013.
True nature: revising ideas on what is pristine and wild
  • F Pearce
PEARCE, F. (2013) True nature: revising ideas on what is pristine and wild. Environment 360. Http://e360.yale.edu/feature/ true_nature_revising_ideas_on_what_is_pristine_and_wild/2649 [accesssed 3 September 2013].