Demographic variation in space and time: implications for conservation targeting

Morrison, Catriona A. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4293-2717, Butler, Simon J., Clark, Jacquie A., Arizaga, Juan, Baltà, Oriol, Cepák, Jaroslav, Nebot, Arantza Leal, Piha, Markus, Thorup, Kasper, Wenninger, Thomas, Robinson, Robert A. and Gill, Jennifer A. (2022) Demographic variation in space and time: implications for conservation targeting. Royal Society Open Science, 9 (3). ISSN 2054-5703

Preview

PDF (Published_Version) - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (642kB) | Preview

Abstract

The dynamics of wild populations are governed by demographic rates which vary spatially and/or temporally in response to environmental conditions. Conservation actions for widespread but declining populations could potentially exploit this variation to target locations (or years) in which rates are low, but only if consistent spatial or temporal variation in demographic rates occurs. Using long-term demographic data for wild birds across Europe, we show that productivity tends to vary between sites (consistently across years), while survival rates tend to vary between years (consistently across sites), and that spatial synchrony is more common in survival than productivity. Identifying the conditions associated with low demographic rates could therefore facilitate spatially targeted actions to improve productivity or (less feasibly) forecasting and temporally targeting actions to boost survival. Decomposing spatio-temporal variation in demography can thus be a powerful tool for informing conservation policy and for revealing appropriate scales for actions to influence demographic rates.

Item Type:	Article
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Science > School of Biological Sciences Faculty of Social Sciences > School of Education and Lifelong Learning
Related URLs:	https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/1...
Depositing User:	LivePure Connector
Date Deposited:	30 Mar 2022 13:31
Last Modified:	22 Oct 2022 17:39
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/84353
DOI:	10.1098/rsos.211671

Downloads

Actions (login required)

View Item