Wildlife Habitat Protection Research Articles

Impact of carbon neutralization policy on the suitable habitat distribution of the North China leopard

The Chinese government has introduced a carbon neutral policy to cope with the rapid changes in the global climate. It is not clear what impact this policy will have on wildlife. Therefore, this study analyzed the suitable habitat distribution of China’s unique leopard subspecies in northern Shaanxi, and simulated the potential suitable habitat distribution under different carbon emission scenarios at two time points of future carbon peak and carbon neutralization. We found that in the future SSPs 126 scenario, the suitable habitat area and the number of suitable habitat patches of North China leopard will continue to increase. With the increase of carbon emissions, it is expected that the suitable habitat of North China leopard will continue to be fragmented and shifted. When the annual average temperature is lower than 8 °C, the precipitation seasonality is 80–90 mm and the precipitation of the warmest quarter is greater than 260 mm, the probability of occurrence of North China leopard is higher. The increase in carbon emissions will lead to the reduction, migration, and fragmentation of the suitable habitat distribution of the North China leopard. Carbon neutrality policies can protect suitable wild habitats. In the future, the impact of carbon neutrality policies on future wildlife habitat protection should be carried out in depth to effectively promote the construction of wildlife protection projects.

Optimizing Wildlife Habitat Management in Socio-Ecological Systems: An Evolutionary Game Theory Approach

This paper focuses on the issue of balancing interests between stakeholders and ecosystems in the process of wildlife habitat conservation. By employing evolutionary game theory, an analysis framework for the socio-ecological system of wildlife habitats is constructed, comprising four main entities: central government, farmers, local government, and ecosystems. This framework explores the influencing factors of habitat protection strategies adopted by various stakeholders and the conditions required for the socio-ecological system to evolve towards an ideal state. In this paper, we analyze how the central government can design cost–benefit-based policy mechanisms, control the evolution of the socio-ecological system by altering conditions, and achieve a balance of interests among all parties involved in the habitat protection process. In this study, we find that the central government should establish disturbance monitoring indicators for human activities and ecological restoration, based on different compensation standards. Moreover, the hierarchical management of wildlife habitat according to different management levels can enhance the probability of the socio-ecological system evolving towards an ideal state, while achieving the sum of social costs. Additionally, shifting the compensation strategies for farmers and local governments from cost compensation to benefit compensation will reduce the harmful costs that the ecosystem imposes on the social system, thereby facilitating the realization of an ideal wildlife habitat protection and management model. Therefore, the central government should intensify compensation efforts and design reasonable compensation standards, transitioning the compensation function from cost recovery to income generation. Simultaneously, guidance should be provided to farmers for the rational utilization of forest resources to increase their income. The alignment of agricultural activities with habitat protection goals should be encouraged, and local governments should establish mechanisms for realizing the value of ecological products, making relatively implicit long-term social welfare explicit.

ОСОБЛИВОСТІ ПРАВОВОГО РЕГУЛЮВАННЯ ВИКОРИСТАННЯ ТА ОХОРОНИ ДИКИХ ТВАРИН ЗА ЗАКОНОДАВСТВОМ УКРАЇНИ ТА ЄВРОПЕЙСЬКОГО СОЮЗУ

The article considers the legal basis for the protection and use of wild animals under the legislation of the European Union and Ukraine. The environmental policy pursued by the European Union and Ukraine in the field of wildlife protection is analyzed, in particular, the Association Agreement ratified by Ukraine with the European Union and the Member States. The main aspects and features of the joint efforts for the protection of wildlife are studied, their shortcomings are identified, as well as the approaches to eliminate them are suggested. The author pays special attention to the analysis of the Directives of the Council of the European Union in the field of wildlife protection. Particularly, the Directive of the Council of the European Union «On the protection of wild birds» provides for the creation of the necessary conditions for the protection, management and control of wild bird populations, as well as regulates the use of certain species in the European Union. The Directive lists 175 species of birds which are the responsibility of the Member States of the European Union and contains an exhaustive list of permitted species of birds. The above-mentioned Directive provides a basic legal protection for wild birds from being caught and slaughtered, as well as for the protection of their habitat, in particular concerning the protection of endangered birds and their migratory species. Some Directives of the Council of the European Union are analyzed, the purpose of which is to promote the conservation of biological diversity by protecting the natural habitats of wildlife. In particular, the Directive of the Council of the European Union «On the conservation of natural habitats of wild fauna and flora» provides for the conservation of about 450 species of animals whose extraction is prohibited and establishes lists of wildlife habitats and their species, as well as methods of conservation. The obligation to implement special protection measures to ensure the protection of wildlife habitats rests with the Member States of the European Union. Some other Directives of the Council of the European Union are analyzed, the priority purposes of which are the protection of wild fauna. The national legal framework and law enforcement activities carried out on the territory of Ukraine in the context of the use and protection of wild animals need to be improved and refined in terms of measures provided by the state to protect wildlife.

Adverse and Beneficial Effects of Woody Biomass Feedstock Plantations on Biodiversity and Wildlife Habitats

Abstract Woody biomass feedstock is suitable for direct combustion, gasification, pyrolysis, ethanol or methanol production yielding heat, charcoal, pyrolysis oil, green electricity and bio-propellants. However, there are several issues concerning the environmental, social and economic sustainability of woody biomass production connected to land use, protection of wildlife habitats, conservation and remediation of landscapes. Establishing energy plantations on arable lands or on grasslands is generally considered as working against nature conservation, while setting them up in polluted areas or wastelands could be advantageous for wildlife, because of 1. more permanent cover that provides shelter and biomass for feeding, which is especially important in winter periods; 2. higher architectural complexity of vegetation providing more place for nesting and feeding for wildlife; 3. exploiting the advantages of root filtration, phytoremediation, or using less chemicals; 4. forbs in the undergrowth and young shoots able to provide better quality food for wildlife than the intensive monocultures. The solution is a complex management system, including land use, phytoremediation, waste and wastewater management and ecosystem-based planning incorporated in one dynamic structure.

Small-Area Family Forest Ownerships in the USA

Sixty percent of family forest ownerships in the United States of America (USA) own between 0.4 and 4.0 ha (1–9 ac). Yet, little is known about this segment of family forest ownerships because they are often excluded from data collection or analyses. We utilized national data for the USA collected through the National Woodland Owner Survey to examine small-area ownerships, as well as compare attributes of this ownership group to larger-area ownerships. Small-area ownerships are less active than ownerships of greater than 4.0 ha, but not inactive. Approximately 60% of small-area ownerships have undertaken at least one of the following activities in the previous 5 years: harvesting for personal use, treating invasive plants, reducing fire hazards, and reducing unwanted insects/diseases. While 74% of small-area ownerships rate wildlife habitat protection as an important ownership objective, only 11% have undertaken a wildlife habitat improvement project in the previous 5 years. Both small- and large- (> 4.0 ha) area ownership classes are most interested in the amenity aspects of woodland ownership, but small-area ownerships are significantly less interested in ownership for firewood, timber, recreation and hunting on their land than larger ownerships. Neither ownership class is very likely to have received professional advice about their forestland in the previous 5 years, but the percentage of small-area ownerships who have done so is half that of larger-area ownerships. Both area ownership classes want their forestland to remain forested in the future. Our findings suggest needs and opportunities to engage small-area forest landowners, but likely in different ways and on different topics than when dealing with larger-area ownerships.

Application of Landsat Imagery to Investigate Lake Area Variations and Relict Gull Habitat in Hongjian Lake, Ordos Plateau, China

Lakes in arid and semi-arid regions have an irreplaceable and important role in the local environment and wildlife habitat protection. Relict Gull (Larus relictus), which is listed as a “vulnerable” bird species in the IUCN Red List, uses only islands in lakes for habitat. The habitat with the largest colonies in Hongjian Lake (HL), which is located in Shaanxi Province in China, has been severely threatened by persistent lake shrinkage, yet the variations in the area of the lake and the islands are poorly understood due to a lack of in situ observations. In this study, using the Modified Normalized Difference Water Index, 336 Landsat remote sensing images from 1988–2015 were used to extract the monthly HL water area and lake island area, and the driving factors were investigated by correlation analysis. The results show that the lake area during 1988–2015 exhibited large fluctuations and an overall downward trend of −0.94 km2/year, and that the lake area ranged from 55.02 km2 in 1997 to 30.90 km2 in 2015. The cumulative anomaly analysis diagnosed the lake variations as two sub-periods with different characteristics and leading driving factors. The average and change trend were 52.88 and 0.21 km2/year during 1988–1998 and 38.85 and −1.04 km2/year during 1999–2015, respectively. During 1988–1998, the relatively high precipitation, low evapotranspiration, and low levels of human activity resulted in a weak increase in the area of HL. However, in 1999–2015, the more severe human activity as well as climate warming resulted in a fast decrease in the area of HL. The variations in lake island area were dependent on the area of HL, which ranged from 0.02 km2 to 0.22 km2. As the lake size declined, the islands successively outcropped in the form of the four island zones, and the two zones located in Northwest and South of HL were the most important habitats for Relict Gull. The formation of these island zones can provide enough space for Relict Gull breeding.

Forest overstorey and age as habitat? Detecting the indirect and direct effects of predators in defining habitat in a harvested boreal landscape

Given the importance of wildlife habitat protection in meeting land use management objectives, criteria for “habitat” identification are surprisingly amorphous. For example, while much current habitat modeling has tended to avoid the term “niche modeling”, niche assumptions are implicit – meaning the presence of predators and competitors is essential to whether or not a species uses, or will use, an area. In this paper, we examine environmental variables associated with woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) presence in the boreal forests of northwestern Ontario, Canada. Based on winter aerial surveys conducted in 2010–2013, we used logistic regression to identify important habitat characteristics (and/or their surrogates) and structural equation modeling (SEM) to explore causal and indirect caribou habitat relationships, at broad and fine scales. The best-fit regression model (>10,000ha) to explain caribou presence, at the broad scale, included the presence of moose (Alces alces), wolves (Canis lupus), logging roads and primary roads, and all top models included wolves. In contrast, at the fine scale (<1000ha), older, conifer forest was included in all of the top models of caribou presence. Using SEM, at broad scales, we found significant effects of increases in logging road density resulting in a direct increase in wolf presence, and indirectly in a decrease in caribou presence. However, at fine scales, we found significant direct positive effects between moose browse and moose presence, with indirect negative effects on caribou presence. We provide evidence that, at broad scales, habitat identification that includes logging roads and wolves provides a better measure of suitability of an area for caribou occupation than does forest cover alone. We suggest modeling of present or future habitat for woodland caribou will only be marginally effective if additional covariates of predation risk are not inclusive to the quantification of habitat supply.

Geospatial Evaluation for Ecological Watershed Management II: Changes in Land Use—Land Cover Influence on Ecosystems Services

Ecosystem services are a key to human survival and global sustainability. Consequently, there is the need to avoid unscrupulous or unplanned land use practices that can compromise these services in addition to the ongoing changes in the global climate whose potentially negative impact are yet to be fully comprehended thus far. The primary objective of this study was to evaluate the Land use—land cover changes of some Eastern Shore sub-watersheds of Maryland from 1986-2006 and qualitatively assess the impact of the changes on some key ecosystem services. Landsat-TM data for Maryland Eastern Shore in the United States were analyzed in ENVI and ArcGIS environment and data interpreted qualitatively. The result showed that forest lands increased during the study period and thus enhanced carbon sequestration favorable for mitigating global warming in the area. Also, the extent of surface water cover increased slightly, possibly due to rising sea level and a thus a potential threat to biodiversity and barrier islands nearby. There was also a significant increase in urban lands due to population increase and thus increase in the extent of impervious layers that could lead to reduced surface runoff and increase the potential for surface water quality impairment; this could lead to a reduction in the capacity of surface water ecosystem to provide clean/recreational waters. The increase in the extent of surface water cover was at the expense of the wetlands that shrunk, thereby threatening the coastal ecosystem’s ability to provide services such as storm and wave protection, nutrient cycling, and the protection of wildlife habitat. There was also a decrease in the extent of Agricultural lands which could lead to loss of food and fiber during the study period. There is therefore an urgent need to formulate or intensify existing policies to regulate land use from an ecological health standpoint in order to ensure sustainability of the various ecosystems within the watersheds of the Lower Eastern Shore of Maryland in the US, and similar coastal locations elsewhere.

Imposing Connectivity Constraints in Forest Planning Models

Connectivity requirements are a common component of forest planning models, with important examples arising in wildlife habitat protection. In harvest scheduling models, one way of addressing preservation concerns consists of requiring that large contiguous patches of mature forest are maintained. In the context of nature reserve design, it is common practice to select a connected region of forest, as a reserve, in such a way as to maximize the number of species and habitats protected. Although a number of integer programming formulations have been proposed for these forest planning problems, most are impractical in that they fail to solve reasonably sized scheduling instances. We present a new integer programming methodology and test an implementation of it on five medium-sized forest instances publicly available in the Forest Management Optimization Site repository. Our approach allows us to obtain near-optimal solutions for multiple time-period instances in fewer than four hours.

In This Issue

In This Issue

Understanding place meanings in planning and managing the wildland–urban interface: The case of Florida trail hikers

As urban sprawl encroaches into natural ecosystems and recreational use of wildland–urban interface (WUI) areas increases, a better understanding of the values and attitudes of visitors could assist both those visitors and WUI area managers. This study examines the influence that place meanings have on WUI visitors’ benefits sought and preferences for landscape attributes and trail settings and suggests management implications. Data from on-site interviews with the Florida National Scenic Trail hikers through WUI areas were analyzed. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that place meanings consisted of place dependence, place identity, community identity, legacy identity, and nature and natural process. Cluster analysis generated high, -medium, and -low place attached clustered groups. Sociodemographic variables were not significantly related to place meanings, but visitors’ trail use history and the trail's proximity to their residences were related. Significant differences in desired experiences were found between three clustered WUI groups. The highly attached WUI group desired escape, nature learning/exploration, and achievement more strongly than the other clustered groups. Similarly, the highly attached group preferred natural features (e.g., undisturbed nature, wildlife habitat, air, water, and soil quality) and traveling on natural trails more strongly than other groups. These results highlight the importance of maintaining natural conditions in WUI areas that provide biodiversity, higher water and air quality, protection of wildlife habitat, and recreation/tourism opportunities, which support human emotional and psychological feelings and well-being and higher levels of meanings ascribed to WUI trails.

A New Deal for Commons? Common Resource Management and the Commons Act 2006

Common land has considerable environmental significance, and a potentially key role in the delivery of the UK government's overall strategy for improving the environmental quality of wildlife habitats in England and Wales. Common land has a unique legal status. Establishing schemes for the conservation management of sensitive habitats and landscapes on common land is complicated by the unusual nature of property rights in commons. A key objective of the Commons Act 2006 is the establishment of a new management regime for the governance of commons based on a self-regulatory model and statutory commons councils. This is an integral – and important – element not only of the government's strategy for improving the protection of wildlife habitats but also for implementing EC Directives on wildlife, including the Habitats and Species Directive of 1992. This article examines the new law on environmental governance in the 2006 Act and concludes with an appraisal of its likely impact.

The Indignity of Federal Wildlife Habitat Law

In this paper I argue that the agencies charged under federal law with the protection and restoration of wildlife populations are to a fault too rational, too deliberative, too sequential in operation, and too focused on putting various tracts of federal realty on highly protective pedestals. To an even greater degree than modern legislation, legal change through regulation is a process weighted down and incapacitated by its own importance, its own dignity. Thus, the overall critique is that our administrative system's commitments to rationality and public participation per se render it incompatible with the societal objective of wildlife habitat protection. In this connection, the federal law of wildlife habitat exemplifies a larger condition of the administrative system perhaps better than any other field of regulation today. The modern practice of conservation biology has shown how important continuous adaptation is to success and how provisional all judgments must be throughout implementation. Federal lands managers, the Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Council on Environmental Quality have all known as much for years. Yet these institutions have done little to adapt their administrative architectures accordingly. As conservation biologists envision this practice, it is reflexive and pragmatic, i.e., continuously self-critical and open to fundamental revisions in light of what is learned in execution. Yet, as the agencies have actually implemented their habitat conservation mandates, they have been neither reflexive or pragmatic - largely as a result of the legal structure of this field. In this paper, I highlight the lack of fit between that structure and this public policy objective and question whether any changes at the federal level could make it much better.

The Prospect of wildlife tourism

The paper extends an overview of the worldwide development of wildlife tourism, introduced the conception of wildlife tourism and its components, and analyzed the development of international wildlife tourism and its international trends. The sustainability of wildlife tourism, the protection of wildlife habitat, as well as the possible impacts of wildlife tourism development in China were discussed.

Monitoring the conservation of grassland habitats, Prairie Ecozone, Canada.

The Prairie Ecozone contains 5% of Canada's land area and represents 16% of the Great Plains of North America. Current estimates indicate that 25-30% of original Canadian grassland habitats remain, largely concentrated in southeastern Alberta and southwestern Saskatchewan with fragments distributed throughout southern Manitoba. The size, distribution and condition of native grasslands serve as valuable indicators of the ecological integrity and the sustainability of those landscape types. With so little native grasslands remaining, areas that conserve grasslands serve as core sites for indicators such as gaps in ecosystem and wildlife habitat protection, i.e. which ecosystems are well-represented, poorly represented or have no representation. Such gap analyses helps to determine where protection efforts need to be placed in the future. Overall, about 3.5% of the Prairie Ecozone of Canada is under some form of conservation area status. This paper reports, relative to the ecoregions and political jurisdictions of the Prairie Ecozone, on the amount and distribution of various types of conservation areas and native grasslands. Relationships between the occurrence of conservation areas and grasslands are presented. Implications for conservation area planning and management are discussed within regional, national and international contexts. The issue of which characteristics of conservation areas should be assessed and monitored to address conservation objectives for sustainability is also discussed.

State Forest Practice Regulatory Programs: An Approach to ImplementingEcosystem Management on Private Forest Lands in the United States

/ Implemented in the context of a long history ofintense public debate, forestry practices applied on private forest land areregulated in some form by 38 states. State regulatory activities can involvemany agencies implementing numerous regulatory laws, a single forestry agencyadministering a comprehensive regulatory program, or a combination of thetwo. Regulatory programs are designed to protect resources such as soils,water, wildlife, and scenic beauty. Program administration often involvesrule promulgation, harvest plan reviews, coordination of interagency reviews,and pre- and postharvest on-site inspections. Forest practice rules usuallyfocus on reforestation, forest roads, harvest procedures, and wildlifehabitat protection. Emerging regulatory trends include growth of multiagencyregulatory authority and associated jurisdictional conflicts, increasedtendencies to narrowly specify standards in statutes and rules, emergence ofcontingent regulations, growing sensitivity to processes enabling theadoption of new forest practice technologies and an ability to addresscumulative effects, interest in collaborative rule-making stemming fromheightened concern over legalization of administration processes, and growingconcern over the constitutional foundations for regulatory programs and thegovernment and private sector cost of implementing such programs.KEY WORDS: Ecosystem management; Forestry practices; Private landowners;Regulatory programs; State government

Translating Legal Rights into Management Practice: Overcoming Barriers to the Exercise of Co-Management

In many cases the management of certain common property natural resources has been successfully shared between government agencies and groups claiming co-management rights. This analysis adds to existing middle-range theoretical propositions about how such co-management arrangements develop, and specifically how groups overcome barriers to co-management when their co-management rights are protected in law but resisted politically. The paper examines a range of strategies used successfully by a coalition of environmental groups and Indian tribes with rights to participate in fish and wildlife habitat protection in the state of Washington. Their struggle first to procure co-management agreements and then to have the agreements implemented has implications for the theory and practice of joint management of other common property resources, especially where multiple agencies and parties are involved.

Significant coastal fish and wildlife habitat protection in New York's coastal management program: T.F. Hart Jr & A.S. Milliken, Coastal Management, 19(1), 1991, pp 55–72

Significant coastal fish and wildlife habitat protection in New York's coastal management program: T.F. Hart Jr & A.S. Milliken, Coastal Management, 19(1), 1991, pp 55–72

Significant coastal fish and wildlife habitat protection in New York's coastal management program

Abstract Diversity of animal species inhabiting New York State's coastal area is recognized through the designation of significant habitats based on their importance for vulnerable species, population levels, ecological rarity, and human importance. Protection of these habitats, and species diversity throughout the coast, is available through the implementation of a habitat policy within New York's Coastal Management Program. Approximately 240 habitat areas are in various stages of a designation and approval process throughout the state's coastal area for protection under this policy. The implementation of the habitat policy has been limited, due in part to the difficulty of using an ecological approach for determining possible habitat impairment. Despite difficulties encountered in implementing habitat protection, the Coastal Zone Management Act provides a useful approach for protection of species diversity.

Converting stewardship values into policy: The mission of the 1990 Farm Bill

AbstractFarmers committed to the overall goal of sustainability in agriculture have banded together to support legislative action favorable to that goal. Specific objectives relate to addition of organic amendments to soils to improve fertility, avoidance of excessive use of pesticides and synthetic fertilizers, crop rotation, species diversity among crops, protection of wildlife habitats, and support of family-operated farms. Currently applicable legislation is believed to be unfavorable to some of these objectives and needs modification.