Protected Areas in Europe

Gaston, Kevin J.; Jackson, Sarah F.; Nagy, Arnold; Cantú‐Salazar, Lisette; Johnson, Mark P.

doi:10.1196/annals.1439.006

Cited by 132 publications

(60 citation statements)

References 111 publications

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“…In naturally occurring landscapes, the relative area impacted by spillover would likely vary by patch size. Our results may translate directly to the many landscapes where only small natural areas remain, such as Europe, where 78% of natural areas are Ͻ1 km 2 (27). It is less clear how our results might translate to landscapes with larger protected areas containing relatively less edge, where area affected by spillover might be proportionally smaller.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 74%

Landscape connectivity promotes plant biodiversity spillover into non-target habitats

Brudvig

Damschen

Tewksbury

et al. 2009

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

165

120

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Conservation efforts typically focus on maximizing biodiversity in protected areas. The space available for reserves is limited, however, and conservation efforts must increasingly consider how management of protected areas can promote biodiversity beyond reserve borders. Habitat corridors are considered an important feature of reserves because they facilitate movement of organisms between patches, thereby increasing species richness in those patches. Here we demonstrate that by increasing species richness inside target patches, corridors additionally benefit biodiversity in surrounding non-target habitat, a biodiversity ''spillover'' effect. Working in the world's largest corridor experiment, we show that increased richness extends for approximately 30% of the width of the 1-ha connected patches, resulting in 10 -18% more vascular plant species around patches of target habitat connected by corridors than around unconnected but otherwise equivalent patches of habitat. Furthermore, corridor-enhanced spillover into non-target habitat can be predicted by a simple plant life-history trait: seed dispersal mode. Species richness of animal-dispersed plants in non-target habitat increased in response to connectivity provided by corridors, whereas species richness of wind-dispersed plants was unaffected by connectivity and increased in response to changes in patch shape-higher edge-to-interior ratio-created by corridors. Corridors promoted biodiversity spillover for native species of the threatened longleaf pine ecosystem being restored in our experiment, but not for exotic species. By extending economically driven spillover concepts from marine fisheries and crop pollination systems, we show how reconnecting landscapes amplifies biodiversity conservation both within and beyond reserve borders.dispersal ͉ habitat corridors ͉ halos ͉ life-history traits ͉ reserve design H abitat destruction is the leading cause of biodiversity loss (1). Global efforts to prevent extinctions focus on protecting and augmenting species diversity within reserves, but the amount of protected habitat remains alarmingly small and inadequate for most taxa (2). Reserves would have greater impact if their benefits extended beyond their boundaries into surrounding non-target habitat-a process termed spillover in marine reserves (3) and halos in terrestrial systems (4) (hereafter referred to as spillover).Spillover effects have most often been examined in terms of ecosystem services provided by protected areas to surrounding non-target areas, for example, higher fish catch in marine systems (e.g., 3-5) and improved crop pollination in terrestrial systems (6, 7). Spillover, however, is likely more general, perhaps extending to biodiversity as a whole (5). Although spillover concepts are prominent in countryside biogeography, which focuses on landscapes heavily altered by humans (e.g., 8), we could find only 2 studies, both from the same landscape, documenting spillover effects for biodiversity in terrestrial systems (7,8). Importantly, in both marine ...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 74%

Landscape connectivity promotes plant biodiversity spillover into non-target habitats

Brudvig

Damschen

Tewksbury

et al. 2009

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

165

120

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“…those of the highest conservation concern. In Europe, the Natura 2000 network of protected areas (N2000) has become the mainstay of current conservation policies (Gaston et al 2008). N2000 is based on two European Directives: (i) the Birds Directive (79/409/EEC), which provides a list of birds for which the member states are required to designate Special Protection Areas for birds (SPAs); and (ii) the Habitat Directive (92/42/EEC), which aims to protect specific animals (other than birds), plants and habitats for which each member state is required to designate special areas of conservation (SACs).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Are species listed in the Annex II of the Habitats Directive better represented in Natura 2000 network than the remaining species? A test using Spanish bats

2015

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One of the main aims of protected areas is to be effective in the conservation of target species, i.e. those of the highest conservation concern. The Natura 2000 network (N2000) of protected areas is the main pillar of European action to halt biodiversity loss. Within N2000, special areas of conservation (SACs) are designated to protect habitats and species of the highest conservation interest, i.e. habitats from Annex I and species (other than birds) listed in Annex II of the Habitat Directive. Thus, a critical and urgent task is to assess the effectiveness of N2000 in the protection of these species. Here, we used distribution data for Spanish bats to test whether the species included in Annex II are better represented in N2000 than the remaining bats found in Spain, since SAC sites were specifically designated to protect the former species. In general, we found significantly high overlapping values between species distribution and N2000 sites (both groups of species are in general over-represented in N2000). However, contrary to our expectations, N2000 (even when only SACs were considered) did not offer higher representation values for the species listed in Annex II than for other species. We found that N2000 performed well even for non-target species, and that species from Annex II could have acted as effective umbrella species for the remaining bat species. Finally, the usefulness of including a species in Annex II is discussed, and guidelines to improve the efficiency of the N2000 for bat conservation are offered. Communicated by Danna J. Leaman. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (

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“…One way to minimize costs is to couple models of species distribution under future climate with quantitative reserve selection algorithms to prioritize efficient land acquisition for conservation Hannah et al, 2007;Gaston et al, 2008;Hannah, 2008;Phillips et al, 2008). This may not, however, be immediately achievable in all places.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Targeted protection and restoration to conserve tropical biodiversity in a warming world

Shoo

Storlie

VanDerWal

et al. 2010

Global Change Biology

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Complex landscapes interact with meteorological processes to generate climatically suitable habitat (refuges) in otherwise hostile environments. Locating these refuges has practical importance in tropical montane regions where a high diversity of climatically specialized species is threatened by climate change. Here, we use a combination of weather data and spatial modeling to quantify thermally buffered environments in a regional tropical rainforest. We do this by constructing a spatial surface of maximum air temperature that takes into account important climatemediating processes. We find a strong attenuating effect of elevation, distance from coast and foliage cover on maximum temperature. The core habitat of a disproportionately high number of endemic species (45%) is encompassed within just 25% of the coolest identified rainforest. We demonstrate how this data can be used to (i) identify important areas of cool habitat for protection and (ii) efficiently guide restoration in degraded landscapes to expand extant networks of critical cool habitat.

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Protected Areas in Europe

Cited by 132 publications

References 111 publications

Landscape connectivity promotes plant biodiversity spillover into non-target habitats

Landscape connectivity promotes plant biodiversity spillover into non-target habitats

Are species listed in the Annex II of the Habitats Directive better represented in Natura 2000 network than the remaining species? A test using Spanish bats

Targeted protection and restoration to conserve tropical biodiversity in a warming world

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