Scientists document collapse of the white-lipped peccary

Date: February 5, 2020

Source: Washington State University

White-lipped peccaries have declined by as much as 87% to 90% from their historical range in Central America, signaling a population collapse of a key species in the region, according to a study published recently in the journal Biological Conservation. The research was conducted by a team of 50 scientists from 30 organizations including Washington State University, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and El Colegio de Frontera Sur.

A pig-like animal that is an important food source for large animal predators and humans alike, the white-lipped peccary (Tayassu pecari) also plays a critical ecological role by dispersing seeds and creating water holes that benefit other animals. The study found that current IUCN estimates underestimated the population decline. The study results are a 63% drop from the current IUCN range estimates for the region.

"White-lipped peccary populations are in more of a critical condition than previously thought," said lead author Dan Thornton of Washington State University. "While these results are sobering, they also offer a roadmap on how to conserve this iconic, ecologically important species."

The researchers say that human influence and loss of forest cover are the primary causes of the decline, and that peccaries now remain in increasingly threatened pockets of forest mostly found along transboundary areas. Outside of transboundary landscapes, remaining populations were generally scattered and isolated.

Due to their social behavior and anti-predatory defense of grouping together when threatened, white-lipped peccaries are highly sensitive to hunting. Their large area needs and reliance on widely dispersed fruit and water sources also makes this species highly vulnerable to forest loss and fragmentation.

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Moth populations in steady decline in Britain, study finds

Long-running survey finds 1976 heatwave boom has been followed by dropping numbers.

Moths are declining in abundance by 10% each decade in Britain but the average weight of moths caught in traps is still double what it was in 1967, according to a new study.

Researchers studying the biomass of moths caught in the world’s longest-running insect survey said their findings suggested that if there had been an “insect armageddon” in Britain, it had occurred before scientific recording began in 1967.

Rather than a precipitous recent decline, scientists at the University of York found that moth populations had boomed following the 1976 heatwave – and moth biomass today was still twice as high as 1967 levels – but there had been a steady decline in abundance since 1982.

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Millions of monarch butterflies killed on Texas highways

NOVEMBER 5, 2019

by Texas A&M University

Monarch butterflies are moving south through Texas on their annual autumn migration to overwintering sites in Central Mexico, but millions die in collisions with vehicles while flying low across Texas highways. Monarch numbers have declined about 82% over the last 23 years, and road mortality can significantly contribute to their dwindling numbers.

The monarch butterfly, Texas' state insect, was petitioned for protection under the federal Endangered Species Act in 2014. In response, many individuals, agencies and organizations, including Texas A&M's Department of Entomology, have been working to understand why the monarch population is so diminished and find solutions.

The problem for monarch butterflies in Texas

The early spring and closing autumn monarch migratory events occur in Texas. Some monarchs travel 3,000 miles from Canada to Mexico in the autumn, then return another 1,0000 miles back to Texas and Oklahoma in the spring to lay eggs. This gives the monarch the distinction of the longest migration of any insect.

On their journey North in the spring, monarchs lay eggs on milkweeds and pass through two generations in Texas before dispersing throughout the Midwest and Eastern U.S. Later generations reach as far north as Canada by the end of summer. On the return journey south during the autumn, the butterflies move through narrowing areas on their migration to Mexico. They basically go through a geographic funnel during their return to Mexico in the Fall.

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On the real Watership Down, rabbits are hard to come by

Numbers may be at an all time low as a new adaptation of the novel hits our TV screens

Chris Howard

Sat 22 Dec 2018 08.00 GMTLast modified on Thu 27 Dec 2018 10.51 GMT

The real Watership Down is not hard to find.

In the introduction to his book, Richard Adams helpfully gives the Ordnance Survey map reference – sheet 174. Once located on paper, long-remembered names jump from the map: Nuthanger Farm, Ashley Warren and Honeycomb are all there. It was the multitude of rabbits found on this little square of England that inspired Adams to write Watership Down.

The book, and the 1978 film that followed, famously terrified a generation. Instead of fluffy bunnies living in a rural idyll, Adams’s rabbits were both calculated killers and senselessly slaughtered. It was red in tooth and claw, and in the case of the film, shown in glorious and brutal Technicolor.

But with a new BBC/Netflix adaptation apparently taking a gentler tone, what is the reality for the UK’s rabbit population?

For Dr Diana Bell, a rabbit disease expert at the University of East Anglia, it’s pretty dire. “Rabbits may be at an all time low” she says. “When did you last see a roadkill rabbit? You don’t anymore – they simply aren’t around like they used to be”

The figures bear her out. Bell points to a report by the British Trust for Ornithology, which estimated that the population had declined by 60% between 1995 and 2016.

On Watership Down itself, rabbits are certainly hard to come by. The Warren, a deep combe set into the Down, is pockmarked with burrows, but an hour’s watching reveals just four rabbits.

Although there are fewer rabbits, the landscape does bear marks of the book. The huge beech tree that sheltered the Watership Down warren was a landmark for many years. “People used to really care about that tree,” says local resident Bryan. “One lady even made her husband drive three hours from Cheshire in the great storm of 1987 just to check it was all right”.

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Australian fur seal pup population is shrinking

Long-term monitoring program effective in tracking seal populations over time

Date:  September 5, 2018

Source:  PLOS

A census of annual pup production by Australian fur seal populations revealed the first reduction since species-wide protection was implemented in 1975, according to a study published September 5 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Rebecca McIntosh of the Phillip Island Nature Parks in Victoria, Australia, and colleagues. The study also shows that the long-term monitoring program for the Australian fur seal has effectively tracked population trends over time.

In the marine environment, monitoring the abundance and population trends of a top predator can provide measures of ecosystem health and management success. Fur seals, Arctocephalus pusillus doriferus, are important upper trophic level predators that, in Australia, are a protected marine species facing specific challenges related to fisheries and aquaculture management, ecotourism, potential impacts on seabirds, and response planning for oil spills and other emergencies. For these reasons, it is important to obtain accurate information about their abundance and population changes. An ad-hoc monitoring program coordinated across multiple stakeholders conducted a range-wide census of live pups in the Austral summers of 2002, 2007 and 2013. In the new study, McIntosh and colleagues set out to assess whether the monitoring program for the Australian fur seal is achieving its goals of determining pup abundance and estimating population trends.

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Most of countryside now devoid of hedgehogs, study finds

Something ‘fundamentally wrong’ in rural landscape, scientists say, with numbers thought to have fallen 80% since 1950s

Damian Carrington Environment editor

Thu 6 Sep 2018 14.00 BSTLast modified on Thu 6 Sep 2018 19.35 BST

A “perfect storm” of intensive farming and rising badger populations has left most of the countryside in England and Wales devoid of hedgehogs, according to the first systematic national survey.

The research used footprints left by hedgehogs in special tunnels to reveal that they were living at just 20% of the 261 sites surveyed. Hedgehogs, which topped a vote in 2013 to nominate a national species for Britain, were significantly less common where badgers were more numerous. Badgers eat hedgehogs and also compete for the beetles and worms the prickly animals consume.

However, hedgehogs and badgers lived alongside each other in half the hedgehog sites, while a quarter of all the sites had neither animal, showing the destruction of habitat such as hedgerows and coppices was also a major factor.

 “There are lots of areas in the countryside that are not suitable for hedgehogs or badgers,” said Ben Williams, at the University of Reading, who led the new work. “There is something fundamentally wrong in the rural landscape for those species and probably lots of other species as well,” such as birds and shrews.

Previous work based on visual sightings and roadkills indicated that the number of hedgehogs living in the British countryside has plummeted by more than half since 2000. Historical hedgehog numbers are hard to estimate, but scientists think populations have fallen by at least 80% since the 1950s.

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UK gardeners urged to build ponds as sightings of frogs and toads dry up

Sightings of toads have fallen by nearly a third and frogs by 17% since 2014, RSPB survey finds

Patrick Barkham

Thu 21 Jun 2018 06.28 BST

People with gardens are being urged to create simple ponds or areas of long grass because sightings of frogs and toads in gardens are drying up.

Reports of toads in gardens have fallen by nearly a third since 2014, while sightings of frogs have dropped by 17% over the same period, according to the Big Garden Birdwatch, the RSPB’s wildlife survey.

Frogs were the most common non-bird garden visitor, seen in 39% of the more than 174,000 gardens which took part in the survey this year, while toads were only found in one in five gardens.

These declines are mirrored by other surveys, including data from volunteer groups who help toads cross the road, which found toad numbers have fallen by more than two-thirds over 30 years.

The declines in gardens are linked to a loss of ponds in gardens and the RSPBis calling on people to take simple measures to help garden amphibians, which rely on sources of water to survive but also often live in longer grass, logpiles or stones.

“There are lots of simple things we can all do in our outdoor spaces to make them perfect for wildlife,” said Daniel Hayhow, RSPB conservation scientist.“Creating a small pond in your garden, or a pool using a washing-up bowl is so simple to do and could make all the difference.”

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Water vole areas in England and Wales fall by 30% in a decade

Species remains UK’s fastest declining mammal despite large reintroduction programme

Haroon Siddique

Mon 26 Feb 2018 00.01 GMT

The number of areas where water voles are found across England and Wales has fallen by almost a third in 10 years, research has found.

The species, which provided the model for the much-loved character Ratty in The Wind of the Willows, has suffered catastrophic declines over several decades and is the UK’s fastest declining mammal.

Habitat loss, water pollution and the introduction of American mink – originally farmed for their fur, but which escaped into the wild and proved a voracious predator – have all contributed to the slump in the number of voles.

Analysis led by the Wildlife Trusts found a decline of 30% in the areas where they live between 2006 and 2015. A slight increase in their distribution was recorded in the last few years, thanks to conservation efforts by wildlife groups – the biggest reintroduction of water voles in the UK began last year – but the situation remains bleak.

Ellie Brodie, the senior policy officer for the Wildlife Trusts, said: “Water voles are an essential part of our wild and watery places and it’s terribly sad that we’re continuing to witness huge declines of this much-loved mammal.

“The Wildlife Trusts and others are working hard to help bring them back again and care for the places they need to survive – but much more is needed if we’re going to stop this charismatic creature disappearing altogether.”

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North Atlantic right whales decline confirmed: 458 remaining

Study confirms need for urgent action

Date:  September 19, 2017

Source:  NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center

Summary:

Marine biologists have developed a new model to improve estimates of abundance and population trends of endangered North Atlantic right whales, which have declined in numbers and productivity in recent years. Between 1990 and 2010 abundance increased to 482 animals, but since 2010 the numbers have declined to 458 in 2015, with 14 known deaths this year.

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Urban butterfly declines 69% compared to 45% drop in countryside

Pesticides, paving and higher temperatures have put huge strain on butterflies in cities over past two decades, finds study

Patrick Barkham

Thursday 16 February 2017 06.01 GMT 

Butterflies have vanished from towns and cities more rapidly than from the countryside over the past two decades, according to a new study.

Industrial agriculture has long been viewed as the scourge of butterflies and other insects but city life is worse – urban butterfly abundance fell by 69% compared to a 45% decline in rural areas over 20 years from 1995.

Butterfly species such as the small copper and small heath have suffered particularly disastrous urban declines, according to the study published in the journal Ecological Indicators. 

Scientists at Butterfly Conservation, the University of Kent and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology found that numbers of small heath fell by 78% in urban areas compared to just 17% in the countryside, while small copper abundance fell by 75% in urban areas compared to 23% in the countryside.

Prof Tom Brereton, head of monitoring at Butterfly Conservation and one of the study’s co-authors, said causes included heightened effects of climate change in cities, building on urban green space, the loss of surprisingly wildlife-rich brownfield sites, council cuts and the neglect of parks and pesticide-wielding gardeners who have also turned lawns and flower beds into driveways and patios.

He said: “Urban areas are under massive pressure. People are paving over gardens for drives or patios and putting more pesticides on their gardens per area than are put on farmland. Bigger gardens are being sold off for development and councils have less resources for managing green spaces.”

The study, which compares trends for 28 species in urban and countryside environments, found that most urban butterflies are emerging earlier and are longer-lived than the same species living in rural areas.

On average, city butterflies emerge two days earlier than their country cousins. Urban brimstones are on the wing five days earlier than those found in rural locations.

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US: Oceanic whitetip shark warrants 'threatened' listing

February 5, 2017 by Patrick Whittle

The oceanic whitetip shark's declining status in the wild warrants listing as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, an arm of the federal government has determined. 

The shark is found around the world, mostly in open water, and the conservation group Defenders of Wildlife called on the government to list the species. The listing would be the most widespread shark listing in the U.S. to date.

The National Marine Fisheries Service said in a document published in the Federal Register in December that the sharks are indeed likely to become endangered in all or at least a significant portion of their range "within the foreseeable future."

Threats to the sharks include fishing pressure all over the world, as their fins are prized in Asian markets for use in soup. The sharks have declined by 80 to 90 percent in the Pacific Ocean since the 1990s, and 50 percent to 85 percent in the Atlantic Ocean since the 1950s, said Chelsey Young, a natural resource management specialist for the fisheries service.

"The oceanic whitetip has very large pectoral fins, and so they have fetched a high price on the international market in Asia," Young said. "It incentivized the fin trade."

The fisheries service is collecting public comments about the shark's status until March and is expected to make a final decision in November. Listing the species as threatened would afford it protections aimed at recovery.

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