How effective are protected areas for reducing threats to biodiversity? A systematic review protocol

Cryptic species conservation: a review

Cryptic species are groups of two or more taxa that were previously classified as single nominal species. Being almost morphologically indistinguishable, cryptic species have historically been hard to detect. Only through modern morphometric, genetic, and molecular analyses has the hidden biodiversity of cryptic species complexes been revealed. Cryptic diversity is now widely acknowledged, but unlike more recognisable, charismatic species, scientists face additional challenges when studying cryptic taxa and protecting their wild populations. Demographical and ecological data are vital to facilitate and inform successful conservation actions, particularly at the individual species level, yet this information is lacking for many cryptic species due to their recent taxonomic description and lack of research attention. The first part of this article summarises cryptic speciation and diversity, and explores the numerous barriers and considerations that conservation biologists must navigate to detect, study and manage cryptic species populations effectively. The second part of the article seeks to address how we can overcome the challenges associated with efficiently and non-invasively detecting cryptic species in-situ, and filling vital knowledge gaps that are currently inhibiting applied conservation. The final section discusses future directions, and suggests that large-scale, holistic, and collaborative approaches that build upon successful existing applications will be vital for cryptic species conservation. This article also acknowledges that sufficient data to implement effective species-specific conservation will be difficult to attain for many cryptic animals, and protected area networks will be vital for their conservation in the short term.

EGO to ECO: Tracing the History of Radioecology from the 1950's to the Present Day

This paper starts with a brief history of the birth of the field of radioecology during the Cold War with a focus on US activity. We review the establishment of the international system for radiation protection and the science underlying the guidelines. We then discuss the famous ICRP 60 statement that if "Man" is protected, so is everything else and show how this led to a focus in radioecology on pathways to "Man" rather than concern about impacts on environments or ecosystems. We then review the contributions of Radiation Research Society members and papers published in Radiation Research which contributed to the knowledge base about effects on non-human species. These fed into international databases and computer-based tools such as ERICA and ResRad Biota to guide regulators. We then examine the origins of the concern that ICRP 60 is not sufficient to protect ecosystems and discuss the establishment of ICRP Committee 5 and its recommendations to establish reference animals and plants. The review finishes with current concerns that reference animals and plants (RAPs) are not sufficient to protect ecosystems, given the complexity of interacting factors such as the climate emergency and discusses the efforts of ICRP, the International Union of Radioecologists and other bodies to capture the concepts of ecosystem services and ecosystem complexity modelling in radioecology.

Can large-scale tree planting in China compensate for the loss of climate connectivity due to deforestation?

Extensive deforestation has been a major reason for the loss of forest connectivity, impeding species range shifts under current climate change. Over the past decades, the Chinese government launched a series of afforestation and reforestation projects to increase forest cover, yet whether the new forests can compensate for the loss of connectivity due to deforestation-and where future tree planting would be most effective-remains largely unknown. Here, we evaluate changes in climate connectivity across China's forests between 2015 and 2019. We find that China's large-scale tree planting alleviated the negative impacts of forest loss on climate connectivity, improving the extent and probability of climate connectivity by 0-0.2 °C and 0-0.03, respectively. The improvements were particularly obvious for species with short dispersal distances (i.e., 3 km and 10 km). Nevertheless, only ~55 % of the trees planted in this period could serve as stepping stones for species movement. This indicates that focusing solely on the quantitative target of forest coverage without considering the connectivity of forests may miss opportunities in tree planting to facilitate climate-induced range shifts. More attention should be paid to the spatial arrangement of tree plantations and their potential as stepping stones. We then identify priority areas for future tree planting to create effective stepping stones. Our study highlights the potential of large-scale tree planting to facilitate range shifts. Future tree-planting efforts should incorporate the need for species range shifts to achieve more biodiversity conservation benefits under climate change.

How Effective Is Environmental Protection for Ensuring the Vitality of Wild Orchid Species? A Case Study of a Protected Area in Italy

Orchids are among the plants most threatened by anthropic impact and environmental changes. Therefore, all known orchid species are protected in several countries by regional, national and international legislation. Several studies have cast doubts on the effectiveness of legislation to ensure the protection of wild orchids. We assessed the vitality of four orchid populations in a coastal area in Northern Italy, by monitoring the vegetative and reproductive traits of the orchid populations growing both in the protected sites comprising the Natura 2000 network, and in non-protected sites. We also monitored the level of environmental threat to orchid vitality. The early-flowering deceptive species (Ophrys sphegodes and Anacamptis morio) exhibited high vegetative vitality and experienced similar levels of environmental threat in the protected and non-protected areas. However, their reproductive success was strongly jeopardized, probably by a failed pollination that impeded the fruit set. The late-flowering, partially or totally rewarding species (Anacamptis pyramidalis and Anacamptis coriophora) were more strongly impacted by spring mowing and ungulate herbivory and alien species. Only for A. coriophora were the herbivory and alien species invasions lower at the protected vs. non-protected sites, which ensured a higher population vitality at the protected sites. We conclude that the environmental protection in our study area is ineffective for preserving orchids without targeted actions against specific environmental threats.