Top Research Papers on Wildlife Conservation

A multilevel model of value shift is introduced to describe the changing social context of wildlife conservation and contend that agencies will need to embrace new strategies to engage and represent a growing segment of the public with mutualism values.

It is argued that animal ecologists can capitalize on large datasets generated by modern sensors by combining machine learning approaches with domain knowledge by incorporating machine learning into ecological workflows.

The primary areas in which population genomics approaches can be applied to wildlife conservation and management are reviewed, examples of how they have been used are highlighted, and recommendations for building on the progress that has been made are provided.

As urbanization continues to expand across the globe, urban wildlife research is critical for urban planners and conservation practitioners to create livable cities for both humans and wildlife. In 2012, Magle et al. conducted a foundational review on the status of urban wildlife research. The authors described the status of urban wildlife research as of 2010 and offered suggestions for future advancements in the field. We conducted a systematic review following Magle et al. (2012) to provide a 10-year update on the state of urban wildlife research globally and describe recent advancements in ...

The terrestrial vertebrates harbored higher genetic and phylogenetic diversity in South China and Southwest China than in other regions and climatic factors had significant positive effects while altitude and human population density had significant negative impacts on levels of mitochondrial DNA-based genetic diversity.

It is suggested that the COVID-19 crisis provides a unique opportunity for a paradigm shift both in the global food system and also in the approach to conservation, and that local people must be at the heart of such policy shifts.

It is argued that the net conservation impacts of COVID-19 will be strongly negative in Africa, and the critical importance of conserving habitat and regulating unsafe wildlife trade practices to reduce the risk of future pandemics.

A bigger picture including areas outside of the current borders of KAZA TFCA should be considered to sustainably manage and conserve wildlife populations and support re-connecting ecologically important areas for congested populations to move to and reduces the concentration of wildlife and pressure on the land and people of the region.

Both social media information and field data suggest that a reduction of human disturbance allowed wildlife to exploit new habitats and increase daily activity, and the lower human disturbance linked to lockdown was in fact beneficial for invasive alien species.

Human-wildlife interactions increase exponentially as more and more humans and wildlife crowd into the same limited space. Such interactions often become conflicts when wildlife threaten human health and safety, well-being, or the food supply. This second edition of Human-Wildlife Interactions: From Conflict to Coexistence provides a comprehensive review of the severity of these problems and the methods used to resolve clashes between humans and wildlife. During his forty-year career as a wildlife professor and scientist, Dr. Michael Conover, founder of journal Human-Wildlife Interactions, has...

The finding that antibiotic resistance genes, currently causing problems at hospitals, might spread through horizontal gene transfer among the bacteria present in the microbiomes of ubiquitous animals as cockroaches, fleas or rats, supports the possibility that these organisms might be bioreactors for the horizontal transfer of antibiotics resistance genes among human pathogens.

A decentralized model could address global health risks associated with wildlife exploitation because to date there are no international or national conventions on pathogen screening associated with animals, animal products, or their movements, and capacity for EID diagnostics is limited along much of the human-wildlife interface.

This review synthesizes the current knowledge concerning the geographic and host taxonomic distribution of mange in wildlife, the epidemiological connections between species, and the potential threat of sarcoptic mange for wildlife conservation and proposes a new agenda for the study of sarcoptes scabiei in wildlife.

A meta-analysis of 31 mammal, bird and reptile studies reveals that hunting or trapping for the wildlife trade is associated with decreased abundances, even where harvesting for trade occurs in protected areas.

Investigation of the occurrence and the antibiotic resistance patterns of several bacterial species in certain wild animals in Germany, including wild boars, roe deer and wild ducks and geese, indicates that overall, the prevalence of resistant bacteria in Germany is low.

A basic approach to case studies is recommended aimed at expanding the scope of inquiries into human–wildlife relations beyond studies of rational behavior and quantification of costs and benefits of wildlife to humans.

Abstract Human-wildlife conflict is one of the most pressing sustainable development challenges globally. This is particularly the case where ecologically and economically important wildlife impact the livelihoods of humans. Large carnivores are one such group and their co-occurrence with low-income rural communities often results in real or perceived livestock losses that place increased costs on already impoverished households. Here we show the disparities associated with the vulnerability to conflict arising from large carnivores on cattle ( Bos taurus ) globally. Across the distribution of...

The synthesis revealed that inter- and transdisciplinary approaches and multilevel governance approaches can help stakeholders and institutions implement sustainable management strategies that promote human-wildlife coexistence.

A cross‐disciplinary perspective is presented that integrates human–wildlife conflict, wildlife management, and urban evolution to address how social–ecological processes drive wildlife adaptation in cities and considers how specific management strategies either promote genetic or plastic changes and how leveraging those biological inferences could help optimize management actions while minimizing conflict.

The strong potential for aquaculture to affect the dynamics of diseases in wildlife populations calls for the consideration of collateral disease impacts in risk assessments and biosecurity protocols regarding Aquaculture.

Dynamic risk assessment and targeted surveillance are important tools for the early detection of infection in wildlife, and a framework for collating and synthesising emerging information to inform targeted surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 in wildlife is described.

The importance of being fast and effective in filling the knowledge gaps about non-vertebrate life forms is emphasized in order to achieve an in-depth understanding of global trading patterns across the full canopy of the Tree of Life, and not just its most appealing twig.

Human-wildlife conflict is rising in frequency and severity, but the complex connections among climate dynamics, ecological dynamics, and social dynamics contributing to the heightened conflict have yet to be fully appreciated.

The 2019–2020 megafires in Australia brought a tragic loss of human life and the most dramatic loss of habitat for threatened species and devastation of ecological communities in postcolonial history.

The nature and extent of human wildlife conflict in the study area were profoundly impacted humans, wild animal and the environment through crop damage, habitat disturbance and destruction, livestock predation, and killing of wildlife and human.

A group of researchers deeply concerned about the consequences of illegal or unsustainable wildlife trade are reviewed and highlighted how these can negatively impact species, ecosystems, and society and appeal for urgent action to close key knowledge gaps and regulate wildlife trade more stringently.

P poignant examples of emerging fungal threats in each of three areas: human health, wildlife biodiversity, and food security are focused on.

Purpose To evaluate some of the current discussion about the possible impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on wildlife tourism destinations. There could be either positive and/or negative impacts and this viewpoint provides some reflection on what the future might hold for some if not many wildlife tourism destinations when the global tourism industry resumes. Design/methodology/approach A combination of tourism and environmental impact research studies and online resources are used to demonstrate the wildlife tourism-conservation nexus and provide a commentary regarding the impact of COVID-19 on ...

Climate change and human–wildlife conflict are both pressing challenges for biodiversity conservation and human well-being in the Anthropocene. Climate change is a critical yet underappreciated amplifier of human–wildlife conflict, as it exacerbates resource scarcity, alters human and animal behaviours and distributions, and increases human–wildlife encounters. We synthesize evidence of climate-driven conflicts occurring among ten taxonomic orders, on six continents and in all five oceans. Such conflicts disrupt both subsistence livelihoods and industrial economies and may accelerate the rate ...

Potential risks of IWT on the spreading and emergence of zoonotic pathogens are discussed.

The main objective of this review was to summarize the current knowledge of the impacts of EDCs on reproductive success in wildlife and humans and reinforce the concept that reproduction in Wildlife and humans is negatively impacted by anthropogenic chemicals.

It is argued that sanitary precautions should be taken by humans interacting with any other mammal species in the wild interacting with SARS‐CoV‐2, and that susceptibility or resistance to the virus is, in general, not predictable, or only predictable to some extent, from phylogenetic proximity to known susceptible or resistant hosts.

This review provides a roadmap of the major outstanding questions in behavioural ecotoxicology and highlights the need for increased cross‐talk with other disciplines in order to find the answers.

Based on a citizen science approach, evidence is provided of the negative consequences of macroplastic debris discarded in freshwater and terrestrial environments and the foundation for creating worldwide lists of non-marine species impacted by encounters with plastic debris is laid.

Abstract Human–wildlife conflicts are complex and defy simple explanations and solutions. The fields of conflict analysis and peacebuilding offer insights into the intensity, intractability, and possible approaches to addressing different kinds of conflict. Building on these fields, as well as advances in conservation practice, we adapt a framework for human–wildlife conflict that consists of three levels of conflict over wildlife: Level 1 conflicts are disputes over issues such as crop or livestock loss or concerns about safety, yet typically involve relatively high tolerance of the damage‐in...

Abstract Illegal wildlife trade is gaining prominence as a threat to biodiversity, but addressing it remains challenging. To help inform proactive policy responses in the face of uncertainty, in 2018 we conducted a horizon scan of significant emerging issues. We built upon existing iterative horizon scanning methods, using an open and global participatory approach to evaluate and rank issues from a diverse range of sources. Prioritized issues related to three themes: developments in biological, information, and financial technologies; changing trends in demand and information; and socioeconomi...

It is found that the labor‐intensive steps of processing recordings and estimating animal positions have not yet been automated, and it is expected that increased availability of recording hardware, development of automated and open‐source localization software, and improvement of automated sound classification algorithms will broaden the use of acoustic localization.

T ticks may act as vectors and play an important role in the natural cycle of transmission of coxiellosis among wild vertebrates and livestock and to highlight their potential role as bacterial reservoirs in the transmission of C. burnetii.

It is found that automated detection could be achieved for a wider range of species and under a greater variety of environmental conditions than reported in previous reviews of automated and manual detection in drone-acquired imagery.

The recent antiracist movement in the United States and beyond inspired the Sierra Club, one of the oldest and most prestigious global conservation organizations, to distance itself from its founder John Muir’s racist views. In a statement issued in July, 2020, Sierra Club’s Executive Director, Michael Brune, said, “As defenders of Black life pull down Confederate monuments across the country, we must also take this moment to reexamine our past and our substantial role in perpetuating white supremacy.”1 However, the legacies and consequences of the racist history of American environmentalism e...