Island Land Research Articles

Радиоэкологические исследования в районе архипелага Земля Франца-Иосифа в августе и сентябре 2023 года

The results of a study of the current activity of technogenic isotopes in the coastal zone of the Alexandra Land island of the Franz Josef Land archipelago are presented. Samples of sea water, algae, bottom sediments, soil and vegetation were taken during an expedition carried out under the auspices of the Northern Fleet and the Russian Geographical Society in August and September 2023. In the marine environment and littoral macrophytes, the content of technogenic 137Cs is gradually decreasing in comparison with the indicators of the previous period 2000–2010. In the terrestrial ecosystem, the distribution 137Cs is mosaic; the highest specific activity is found in soils (up to 71.4 Bq/kg). In single samples, the presence of the short-lived isotope 134Cs was noted, which is an indicator of relatively recent atmospheric fallout in the Arctic.

The ecological and evolutionary dynamics of inselbergs.

Islands are fundamental model systems in ecology, biogeography, and evolutionary biology. However, terrestrial islands, unlike their aquatic counterparts, have received comparatively less attention. Among these land islands, inselbergs (i.e. isolated rock outcrops with diverse lithologies and a modest topographical prominence) stand out as iconic examples distributed worldwide across global biomes. Due to their durable lithology, inselbergs change slowly, persisting for tens of millions of years. In this review, we propose a biological definition for inselbergs that captures three fundamental characteristics of inselbergs from the perspective of biota. These are old age, isolation and the presence of unique microhabitats that are rare or absent in the surrounding matrix, fostering distinct communities often with unique and endemic biota. We synthesise the state of the art and formulate a set of testable hypotheses to deepen our understanding of the origins and maintenance of diversity on inselbergs, which are increasingly exposed to anthropogenic threats. By offering different habitats compared to the surrounding habitat matrix (e.g. moist microhabitats in dryland landscapes and xeric environments in humid tropical landscapes), inselbergs may allow specific lineages to thrive beyond their typical geographical limits. Particularly in drylands and degraded landscapes, inselbergs may not just provide different habitats but also act as ecological refuges or evolutionary refugia by providing a wider range of potential microhabitats than the surrounding matrix, enhancing resilience and promoting regional biodiversity. The central role of the matrix ensures that the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of inselbergs differ from those of true islands such as oceanic islands. Given that inselberg biota coexist within a terrestrial matrix, interactions between inselberg and matrix populations impact each other significantly. Over evolutionary timescales, matrix species may contract to inselberg refugia, preserving lineages while cycles of isolation and reconnection may drive speciation via a species pump. Although inselberg biodiversity has been studied predominantly from an island biogeography perspective, we argue that depending on the spatial scale, habitat specificity and mobility of the organisms considered, a range of different theories and paradigms can help explain the biogeography and local distribution patterns of different taxonomic and functional groups of inselberg species.

Umbilicaria aprina and U. rhizinata (Umbilicariaceae, lichenized Ascomycota) in Russia

The distribution of Umbilicaria aprina and U. rhizinata in Russia was revised basing on morphological and molecular-phylogenetic data. Umbilicaria aprina is new to Alexandra Land Island (Franz Josef Land Archipelago), Sverdrup Island (Taimyr Dolgano-Nenets District), the republics of Altai, North Ossetia-Alania and Sakha-Yakutia. Umbilicaria rhizinata is new to the republics of Tyva and Buryatia, Putorana Plateau, Kamchatka Peninsula, and the Magadan Region and is therefore reported for the first time to the Asian Subarctic. New localities of the species in other regions are cited. The ITS\5.8S phylogenetic tree supports the distinctness of U. aprina and U. rhizinata. The distribution map is drawn and patterns of distribution of two species are discussed. Umbilicaria aprina occurs in the high Arctic between 74°N and 81°N, whereas the northernmost locality of U. rhizinata is in the vicinity of Norilsk on the Putorana Plateau (ca. 70°N). In mountains U. aprina grows at higher maximal elevations compared to U. rhizinata.

Flying snails: immigrant selection and the taxon cycle in Pacific Island land snails

Flying snails: immigrant selection and the taxon cycle in Pacific Island land snails

How people, rainfall and vegetation shape tropical island fire regimes across Micronesia

AbstractAimTo provide the first regional analysis of contemporary drivers of Pacific Island fire regimes.LocationIslands of Palau, Yap, Guam, Rota, Tinian, Saipan, Chuuk, Pohnpei, Kosrae.Time Period1950‐present.MethodsWe used land cover, soil maps and contemporary fire histories to (1) describe the relationships among fire activity, vegetation, rainfall and island geography and population; (2) examine the spatial associations of forest and savanna vegetation with respect to fire and soil types; and (3) link fire and savanna distribution to intra‐annual and inter‐annual rainfall variability.ResultsSavanna extent was positively correlated with island age and the range of mean monthly rainfall. The percent of area burned annually reached upwards of 2%–10% of island land areas, correlated positively with rainfall seasonality, and occurred largely within savannas. Savannas were more frequent on acidic soils with higher aluminium than forests but distributed across all soil types. El Niño intensity correlated negatively with dry season rainfall over the entire study region and positively with annual area burned on Guam.Main ConclusionsThe contemporary extents of savannas in Micronesia reflect Pacific Islanders' long‐term use of fire to shape vegetation and are modulated by inter‐ and intra‐annual rainfall variability. These relationships provide baseline information for ongoing fire management and mitigation projects throughout Micronesia and critical insight for assessing and anticipating fire risk in other insular areas where fire data are limited.

The vulnerability of flood disaster to the students secondary school at Jampea Island

Flood is one of the conditions when overflowing water inundated the lower areas. The occurrence of floods always has both positive and negative impacts. If the flood occurs in residential areas, it will have a more negative impact. Therefore, people should have preparedness to prevent the effects of the flood. In 2022, a flood occurred in the Jampea Islands, Selayar Islands regency, and affected 90% of the population. It was caused by the high rainfall intensity that resulted in the higher river discharge and overflowing into settlements. It was unclear how much loss was caused by the flood, but this phenomenon has traumatized the community. This island has been occupied for hundreds of years. However, it has never been a flood that the water inundated 90% of the island's land. Since the flood is possible to occur when the high rainfall intensity happens. Hence, this research was conducted to find out how is community preparedness in disaster mitigation. The community was focused on students at the secondary school level (SMA and SMK). Students were selected by considering their readiness to be more proactive in disaster mitigation through learning practices and socialization in the family environment. The data were collected through an online questionnaire and observation, then analyzed with a diagram presentation system. The results found that the aspect of students' knowledge was still classified as low. While the institutional aspect is still relatively moderate. Therefore, the capacity of students still needs to be strengthened to prevent the magnitude of the risk of flooding.

Heavy Metals in Soil and in Some Environmental Components of Alexandra Land Island (the Franz Josef Land Archipelago)

Heavy Metals in Soil and in Some Environmental Components of Alexandra Land Island (the Franz Josef Land Archipelago)

ТЯЖЕЛЫЕ МЕТАЛЛЫ В ГРУНТАХ И НЕКОТОРЫХ КОМПОНЕНТАХ ПРИРОДНОЙ СРЕДЫ ОСТРОВА ЗЕМЛЯ АЛЕКСАНДРЫ (АРХИПЕЛАГ ЗЕМЛЯ ФРАНЦА-ИОСИФА)

The concentrations and accumulation of heavy metals in Arctic permafrost soil, as well as snow, ice, riverine, and sea water of Alexandra Land Island (the Franz Josef Land Archipelago) were studied in the framework of the UMKA-2021 integrated Arctic expedition of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation and the Russian Geographic Society. The content of heavy metals in Arctic soils on Alexandra Land, including the most hazardous ones, such as cadmium and lead, was low, no MPC exceeding was found. At the same time, increased concentrations of manganese were detected. The concentrations of heavy metals in water, snow, and ice samples corresponded to the natural background for tundra and the Arctic zone.

Evolutionary history of inshore oceanic island land snails diversified in shell colour

AbstractAimOceanic islands provide an excellent opportunity to study the mode and tempo of phenotypic evolution of terrestrial organisms. Many studies have focused on oceanic islands far from the mainland. Oceanic islands near the mainland may provide distinct perspectives on phenotypic evolution, but a comprehensive understanding is still lacking. To address this gap, this study aimed to reveal when a land snail species inhabiting a volcanic archipelago within 40 km of the mainland diverged and how their shell colours evolved.LocationSouthern Izu Peninsula and five Izu Islands (Oshima, Toshima, Niijima, Shikine and Kozu), Japan.Taxon Euhadra peliomphala simodae. MethodsDouble‐digest restriction site‐associated DNA sequencing (ddRAD‐seq) was conducted using 117 individual snails. Molecular phylogenetic and population genomic analyses were performed, including approximation Bayesian computation (ABC). We then examined whether the island area, elevation, distance from the surrounding landmasses and historical event (bottleneck) explain the shell colour diversity on each island using a phylogenetic generalised linear mixed model (PGLMM).ResultsSnails could be genetically categorised according to the island they inhabited, and on Niijima, their genetic structure was further divided within the island. The divergence times among the extant populations of the snail dated back to 2.1 million years ago (Ma), which is older than that of other animals occurring in this region. Additionally, island elevation positively affected shell colour diversity, and populations with similar shell colour profiles were phylogenetically different.Main conclusionsIsland land snails diversified early in the ecosystem of the Izu Islands. This suggests that proximity to the mainland, immobility and the physiological tolerance of passive dispersal in land snails were the main causes of early diversification. Moreover, our study proposes that environments covarying with elevation would determine shell colour diversity on each island through natural selection.

Эффузивно-эксплозивное извержение вулкана Алаид в 2022 г. (о. Атласова, Северные Курильские острова)

Data are presented on a moderate effusive-explosive eruption of the summit crater of Alaid volcano (Atlasov Island, Northern Kuril Islands) observed from September 10 to December 1, 2022. Based on satellite and visual data, it was found that as a result of Strombolian-Volcan activity two lava flows, 2.6 and 1 km long, were poured out on the southern slope of the volcano, and at least 16 emissions occurred to a height of 2.5 to 6 km a.s.l. The ash plumes spread out mainly in the southeast and east-southeast directions, their maximum length reaching 300–500 km. The eruption posed a danger to local airlines. The lava outpouring provoked the formation of lahars that descended the southern slope of the volcano and reached the island coast. The alluvial fan formed from mudflow masses partially deposited beyound the coastline, causing an increase in the island land.

Land Use Changes of Ternate Island 2017-2022

The phenomenon of land use change always increases with population growth so that sooner or later these conditions will cause changes in land use. This study aims to determine changes in land use on Ternate Island in 2017-2022. The method used maximum likelihood classification and used Ternate island land use data from sentinel 2 image extraction in 2017, 2020 and 2022 to analyze changes in land use. There are 7 forms of land use in the study area, namely water bodies, dense vegetation, bushes, farm land, settlements, bare land, Scrub and cloud cover that cannot be extracted from multispectral images. Land use that dominates the island of Ternate is dense vegetation and settlements. Land use, dense vegetation is evenly distributed on the slopes of Gamalama volcano and settlements are scattered at the foot of the volcano. Land use change on Ternate island in 2017-2020 and 2017-2022 is dominated by dense vegetation to settlements. Changes in dense vegetation to gardens and grasses are land clearing activities in preparation for the use of settlement land.

Pengaruh Komposisi Media Tanam (Perbandingan Tanah, Pupuk Kandang, Dan Arang Sekam) Terhadap Pertumbuhan Dan Hasil Tanaman Kangkung Darat (Ipomoea reptans Poir)

This research was carried out in the experimental garden of the UPT Integrated Field Laboratory / Center for Excellence in Science and Technology on Dry Land Islands, Nusa Cendana University, which was carried out from March to May 2022. growth and yield of land kale and knowing the composition of the growing media (soil ratio, manure and husk charcoal) that can provide the best growth and yield of land kale. This study is an experimental experiment designed using a completely randomized design (CRD) with 7 treatments and 5 replications. The treatments tested in the form of planting media composition (Comparison of Soil, Manure, Husk Charcoal), were as follows: (T0) = 100% soil; (T1) = Soil 1: Manure 1; (T2) = Soil 1 : husk charcoal 1; (T3) = Soil 1: Cow manure 1: Husk charcoal 1; (T4) = Soil 2: Manure 1; (T5) = Soil 2: Husk Charcoal 1 and (T6) = Soil 2: Manure 1: Husk Charcoal 1. The results showed that the combination of planting media (comparison of soil, manure, and husk charcoal) had a significant effect on plant height, number of leaves, gross fresh weight, and net fresh weight of kale as well as the combination treatment of soil and manure (1 : 1) gave the best results for plant height, number of leaves, fresh weight, net weight, which were 18.74 cm for height, respectively. plants, 8.44 leaves for the number of leaves, 17.67 grams for fresh weight and 12.84 grams for plant net weight.

Has long‐distance flight ability been maintained by pigeons in highly insular habitats?

AbstractAimA reduction in dispersal ability has been thought to be a general trend for island land birds. However, recent studies have indicated that long‐distance dispersal among island habitats may be maintained in island pigeon populations. Here, we investigated whether pigeons could maintain their long‐distance dispersal ability to move among islands within the archipelago, even in highly insular conditions, by comparing two subspecies of Japanese wood pigeon distributed on islands with different levels of insularity.LocationThe Ogasawara, Izu and Nansei Islands in the north‐western Pacific Ocean.TaxonJapanese wood pigeon (Columba janthina).MethodsWe compared the hand‐wing index related to dispersal potential between the two subspecies: C. j. janthina and C. j. nitens. We performed phylogenetic analyses with likelihood and Bayesian frameworks and estimated population genetic structure using the principal component analyses and individual admixture analyses based on the genotype likelihood of MIG‐seq SNPs. We calculated divergence times of the two subspecies using Bayesian and PSMC models for MIG‐seq SNPs and whole genome data, respectively.ResultsC. j. nitens had a wing shape that was better suited for long‐distance flight than that of C. j. janthina. Both subspecies maintained sufficient gene flow among the islands within their habitat archipelagos, with no evidence of isolation by distance. The divergence time of the two subspecies was 0.67 (95%CI: 0.33–0.97) million years ago, which was sufficient to reduce dispersiveness compared to other cases of island land birds.Main ConclusionLong‐distance flight can be maintained under highly insular conditions despite long‐term isolation from the ancestral populations. This indicates that the strategy of maintaining dispersal ability may also be possible in island systems, where organisms have repeatedly and globally shown reduced dispersal ability. Although further studies are required to reveal its evolutionary processes, our study provides an exceptional case for island birds' biogeography.

Mollusk loves: Becoming with native and introduced land snails in the Hawaiian Islands

Hawaiian island land snails once represented one of the most diverse archipelagic evolutionary radiations. Historically, indigenous Hawaiians (Kānaka maoli) and Westerners also heard some snails (kāhuli) sing. Today, most of these species are extinct or endangered. One major cause has been the intentional mid-20th century introduction of a land snail, Euglandina rosea, for the biological control of another mollusk, Lissachatina fulica. In this article, I join efforts of noticing and engaging landscapes of the situated Anthropocene with the goal of demonstrating the potential for mollusks to be dynamic alliance-forming companions. In articulating methods of becoming with snails, I pass kāhuli through Western and Kānaka maoli knowledge-making projects. First considering the evolutionary biological work of John Gulick and his counterparts to genealogize contemporary snail-love, I then elaborate on what care and hope might mean with Pacific Island land snails living through ongoing environmental dispossession and alteration. I then reconsider Euglandina on parallel conceptual terms, engaging natural historical and laboratory accounts to think with the introduced mollusk beyond its categorization as ‘alien invader’. Loving Euglandina as well as kāhuli may help realize livable futures for indigenous and introduced Hawaiian island mollusks alike, in a world hopefully full of snail-song.

Ego network analysis of the trophic structure of an island land bird through 300 years of climate change and invaders.

Ego net analysis is a well‐known practice in social sciences, where an ego net (EN) consists of a focal node, the ego, and its links to other nodes, called alters, and alter–alter links may also be included. An EN describes how a focal node is embedded in its interaction context. Here, I introduce EN analysis to ecology in a study of the trophic network of a sub‐Antarctic land bird, Lesser Sheathbill (Chionis minor). Data originate from the sheathbill population on Marion Island in the Southern Ocean. The bird is ego and its enemies and food are alters. The EN is organized along three dimensions: habitat, interaction type, and time (from before human arrival in 1803 and until a future year 2100). Ten EN descriptors are defined, estimated, and used to track the 300 years of change in sheathbill EN structure. Since 1803, the EN has passed two major, but reversible shifts—seal exploitation in the 19th century and presence of cats from 1949 to 1991. These shifts can be read as structural changes in the sheathbill EN. In the future, a third, perhaps irreversible change is predicted, driven by climate change and a surprising, recent shift to seabird predation by House Mouse, the most detrimental of all extant invaders on Marion. In a warmer and drier future, the mouse will proliferate, and if this forces seabirds to abandon the island, their accumulation of detritus runs dry, starving a rich invertebrate detritivore fauna, which also is a key food source to sheathbills. These detritivores together with plants have also constituted the main food sources of mice. The EN descriptors quantify that story. In the future, these events may lead to a collapse of the island ecosystem, including extinction of the sheathbill—unless plans for mouse eradication are implemented.

A Survey of Global Mixed-Energy and Wave-Dominated Barrier Island Distribution and Development

Fenster, M.S.; Hughes, C.P., and Stutz, M.L., 2022. A survey of global mixed-energy and wave-dominated barrier island distribution and development. Journal of Coastal Research, 38(4), 795–806. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. This study quantifies the length, percentage, and type of development found on global mixed-energy and wave-dominated coastal plain and deltaic barrier islands. Google Earth photographic imagery from 2015–2017 was used to measure the lengths of individual islands, identify infrastructure types 300 m landward of the shoreline, and measure the alongshore extent of each island's land uses. The United States Geological Survey's land-use classification scheme enabled categorization and quantification of predominant structure types. The results from this study showed that, of the 1444 mixed-energy and wave-dominated barrier islands located within 53 countries around the world: (1) 832 (approximately 59%) of those barriers islands have some type of development; (2) approximately 16% of the total length of shorelines (approximately 1,793 km/11,249 km) are developed; (3) wave-dominated barriers (approximately 17%) are more developed than mixed-energy (approximately 14%) barriers; (4) coastal plain (approximately 21%) settings have double the development than deltaic settings; (5) the U.S. contains approximately 66% of all developed global barrier island shorelines and the highest percent development of mixed-energy (New Jersey approximately 67%) and wave-dominated (Florida approximately 62%) coastal plain barrier islands in the world; and (6) high-density, residential dwellings dominate development type and comprise an average 14% of the world's barrier island shorelines. Finally, development percentage and/or land use type do not appear to depend on or correlate with hydrodynamic or geologic setting and coastal processes and geology do not influence development type. Instead, site specific or regional factors most likely dictate the percentage and type of development.

Climate Adaptation for Tropical Island Land Stewardship: Adapting a Workshop Planning Process to Hawai‘i

Tropical island ecosystems are highly vulnerable to the multiple threats of climate change (Nurse et al. 2014; Bonan 2008). In response, agencies and organizations are tasked with developing land-management strategies to help ecosystems adapt to changing environmental conditions (Swanston et al. 2016). Research has shown that proactive planning can reduce climate change impacts by facilitating more efficient and rapid responses (Bierbaum et al. 2013). Complex socio-ecological conditions, environmental change related stressors (e.g., wildfire, pests, disease, and drought), a lack of resources, and shifting public policy and agency mandates (Nagel et al. 2017) can all hinder response effectiveness (Crausbay et al. 2020). Despite these challenges, considerable progress has been made in assessing climate vulnerabilities of forest ecosystems and in developing adaptation options for land managers (Swanston and Janowiak 2012; Janowiak et al. 2014; Swanston et al. 2016; Halofsky et al. 2018; Schmitt et al. 2021). Adaptation planning in response to significant anticipated changes is becoming increasingly sophisticated, especially with respect to anticipated changes in forest wildfire regimes, species invasion, species composition, ecosystem health, and hydrological functioning due to climate change. Here we describe our conversion of a highly successful adaptation workshop process (Schmitt et al. 2021) to a virtual environment in response to COVID-19. We effectively delivered content to managers and created an experiential learning environment in which they developed adaptation tactics for their management projects, integrating Indigenous science and knowledge into the workshop format and content. This workshop was additionally novel because it used an adaptation process (Janowiak et al. 2014, Ontl et al. 2018) that has been applied many times in the continental U.S. within primarily temperate and sub-boreal systems (https://forestadaptation.org/), and applied it for the first time to a tropical island system.

Historical DNA from Museum Shell Collections: Evaluating the Suitability of Dried Micromollusks for Molecular Systematics

Natural history collections are an invaluable resource that can inform systematic studies and biodiversity discovery, and also contribute to understanding changes in species abundance and distributions over time. The decline in abundance and diversity of Pacific Island land snails has been a major conservation concern for more than six decades, but only the largest and most colorful snails are protected under the US Endangered Species act, and few are listed as critically endangered on the IUCN Red List. Like most invertebrates, the conservation status of many Hawaiian land snails still need assessment. Molecular data are highly informative for revising species limits and understanding evolutionary patterns and processes, but with as much as 70% of Hawaiian land snails already extinct, few fresh samples are available from which to extract DNA. To overcome the lack of material suitable for DNA barcoding, we test whether short DNA fragments of 225 to 355 bp can be sequenced from museum snail shells containing dried tissues collected more than 50 years ago. Short DNA sequences (225 bp) were obtained from 66.7% of lots, while longer DNA sequences (355 bp) were successfully sequenced from 24.2% of lots. Snail specimens stored in natural history cabinets for more than 100 years were successfully sequenced, supporting the inclusion of these materials for modern biodiversity studies. Molecular data from this study represents a small proportion of Hawaiian microsnail species housed among the millions of specimens in the Bishop Museum in Hawaii and other natural history collections. Additional resources and focused efforts are needed to scale this approach to incorporate many more of the hundreds of snail species in need of assessment in Hawaii. More broadly, there are large representative collections of endangered Pacific Island non-marine snails in many natural history museums that may be suitable for molecular work, either with DNA barcoding or other genomic approaches.

SEISMICITY of the ARCTIC in 2015

The article provides an overview and analysis of seismicity within the boundaries of the Arctic region for 2015, a description of seismic station networks, and processing methods. The catalog of earthquakes in the Arctic region was compiled on the basis of catalogs of several organizations and seismological centers. In total, 334 earthquakes are included in the earthquake catalog. Most of the earthquakes that occurred in 2015, including all the strongest earthquakes, were located within the mid-ocean ridges of Mon, Knipovich and Gakkel. In the offshore territories, most of the earthquakes were confined to the Svalbard archipelago, in particular, to the seismically active zone in the Sturfjord strait. The renewal of instrumental seismological observations in 2011 (station ZFI) on Alexandra Land Island in the Franz Josef Land archipelago made it possible to record weak earthquakes in the north of the shelf of the Barents and Kara Seas. For twelve earthquakes, the focal mechanism parameters are presented according to the Global CMT catalog.

Millimeter-sized smart sensors reveal that a solar refuge protects tree snail Partula hyalina from extirpation

Pacific Island land snails are highly endangered due in part to misguided biological control programs employing the alien predator Euglandina rosea. Its victims include the fabled Society Island partulid tree snail fauna, but a few members have avoided extirpation in the wild, including the distinctly white-shelled Partula hyalina. High albedo shell coloration can facilitate land snail survival in open, sunlit environments and we hypothesized that P. hyalina has a solar refuge from the predator. We developed a 2.2 × 4.8 × 2.4 mm smart solar sensor to test this hypothesis and found that extant P. hyalina populations on Tahiti are restricted to forest edge habitats, where they are routinely exposed to significantly higher solar radiation levels than those endured by the predator. Long-term survival of this species on Tahiti may require proactive conservation of its forest edge solar refugia and our study demonstrates the utility of miniaturized smart sensors in invertebrate ecology and conservation.