Reconstructing migratory network nodes to improve environmental management and conservation decisions: A case study of the common quail Coturnix coturnix as a biosensor

Abstract

Public health risks are related to environmental management practices, and are essential to the understanding of ecosystem dynamics. The expansion of urbanized areas affects migratory bird networks and can impact the population sizes of migratory species and, in parallel, increase the risk of diseases carried by migratory species spreading into urban areas. Taking the European population of the common quail as a case study, we reconstructed its migratory network between Europe and the Maghreb using quail recoveries from the Italian Bird Ringing Scheme. We showed that soils at the central European migratory node have been degraded through urbanization and reforestation, decreasing the number of successful migrations over this area. Conceptual models incorporating the One Health approach, natural and social capital, landscape infrastructure, and ecosystem services could explain the relationships between climate warming and extensively developed, intensively developed, and urbanized ecosystems. Failed migratory flights of quail over central Europe highlight not only the problems of infrastructure design and their impact on ecosystems services, but also on One Health parameters. The damage to migratory network nodes presents a global threat to biodiversity and can increase the spread of diseases. To address this challenge we propose: i) improvements in land quality; ii) transboundary migration monitoring programmes; and iii) management plans for migratory birds – the overall aim being to optimize infrastructures to improve the quality of human life. Lessons drawn from a better understanding of the migratory networks of quail in relation to different ecosystems provide useful tools to improve infrastructure management and political decision making processes.