New research published online today in the British Ecological Society’s Journal of Applied Ecology offers a way to more accurately estimate the size of bird populations using bird song. The technique could offer a way to assess the numbers of hard-to-spot species of bird and could even be used to track the population density of whale and dolphin species.

Deanna Dawson, US Geological Survey, and Murray Efford, University of Otago, New Zealand, recorded the sounds of the Ovenbird, a species of both which is both hard to see and which has a distinctive call, in the Patuxent Research Refuge, near Laurel, Maryland, USA. Using a ‘microphone array’ technique, placing four microphones at intervals and in different locations around the forest, the researchers were able to record the sounds of the ovenbirds and then to combine the recordings from each microphone. Using computer models, the researchers then conducted an analysis, based on the attenuation of the sounds and the relationship between this attenuation and population density, to find the ‘best match’ to the data. In this way they were able to accurately estimate the population size of the ovenbirds.

Biologists have long counted bird songs or calls to generate an index of bird abundance but this relies on being able to see the bird – to assess whether it is within a set distance from the observer. Existing methods of assessing population size also often depend on capturing the birds in nets, which can be very stressful for the animals. This is the first time that sound recordings from a microphone array have been translated into an accurate estimate of bird species populations.

The research has already generated interest from the press in the UK this morning, featuring as a lengthy item on the BBC Radio 4 Today Programme (approx: 7.45am GMT) .
Listen Again to the Today Programme on BBC I-Player

See the Press Release on the BES website: Ecologists sound out new solution for monitoring cryptic species

Deanna K. Dawson and Murray G. Efford (2009). Bird population density estimated from acoustic signals, Journal of Applied Ecology, doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2664.2009.01731.x, is published online today.

Yesterday, the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin’s ‘On the Origin of Species’, saw the launch of the International Year of Biodiversity 2010 in the UK. The BES Policy Team attended an evening reception at the Natural History Museum at which Huw Irranca-Davies MP, Minister for Marine and the Natural Environment at Defra, and Dr Ahmed Djoghlaf, Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, officially launched IYB-UK, 2010. The event also offered a fantastic opportunity for delegates to tour the new Darwin Centre and to interact with many of the exhibits.

The Minister and Dr Djoghlaf acknowledged that the targets to slow and to halt biodiversity loss by 2010 would not be met. Both stressed the importance of IYB 2010 in raising awareness amongst the public about the importance of biodiversity and the need for IYB-UK 2010 partners, including the BES, to increase public outreach and education activities linked to biodiversity. Dr Djoghlaf welcomed the partnership between the UK and Brazil, the UK-Brazil Sustainable Development Dialogue, and hailed discussions, due to take place today in London, bringing together environment ministers to examine the sustainable development of forests.

The Minister used the ocassion to launch a challenge fund as part of the Darwin Initiative, aimed solely at the Overseas Territories. This did not however appear to be a new: the scheme was formally announced by the Minister at an event at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office earlier this year.

The BES is a member of the International Year of Biodiversity – UK 2010 Partnership. For more information see www.biodiversityislife.net.

The BES Policy Team yesterday attended the launch of the National Assessment of UK Forestry and Climate Change report, an exercise established by the Forestry Commission and conducted by a team of experts, led by Professor Sir David Read, Biological Secretary of the Royal Society and Professor of Plant Sciences at the University of Sheffield.

Professor Sir Read began the afternoon with a presentation outlining the main results of the report, which examines the potential of UK forests to assist society in mitigating and adapting to, climate change. The Assessment set out to review and synthesise existing knowledge, to provide baseline information on forests in the UK and to identify gaps and weaknesses to determine research priorities for the next few years.

From the 1950’s – 70’s around 25,000 hectares of woodland was planted each year, but this has declined massively in recent years: we are now harvesting the trees planted during these decades and, as this occurs and forests aren’t replaced, the sequestration of carbon by trees in the UK will fall. UK forests store 790 megatonnes of carbon and remove 15 megatonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere each year. The headline conclusion of the Assessment is that traditional management of the tree stock we already have is not sufficient. In order to enhance sequestration we have to plant new woodland, approximately 23,000 hectares per year on an annual basis from now to 2050.

Professor Read also highlighted ’substitution’, carbon lock-up after felling, as a key way in which the forestry sector could contribute to tackling climate change in the UK. Wood should be used as biomass, as a substitute for fossil fuels, and wood should be greater used by the construction sector.

Professor Read highlighted, albeit briefly, that the Assessment’s proposals would pose difficult questions for the conservation of biodiversity in woodland communities in the UK, particularly given recommendations that non-native tree species (e.g. from the Mediterranean) make up the new forests – as these species may be more likely to thrive as the climate warms. Professor Read called for immediate field-trials to identify those species which it would be most appropriate to grow in the UK, and which would be least likely to beome invasively.

Professor Read’s presentation was followed by an address from the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Hilary Benn, who remained afterwards to take questions as part of the panel discussion. Mr Benn welcomed the report on behalf of the Government, stating that as a nation the UK will have to plant more trees and that the Government will have to ensure that this happens. Alluding to the TEEB (The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity) study, the Minister stressed that trees must be assigned a value standing, as they are felled, and that the UK Government is wiling to pledge its share at the forthcoming Copenhagen climate negotiations to support a REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation) mechanism in developing countries. Mr Benn is due to host a round-table of environment Ministers today, with the Director of the IUCN, examining the sustainable use of the world’s forests.

One major point to emerge from the discussion session following the presentations was the need to recognise the increasing threat posed to trees by pests and disease, with losses eroding any gains in coverage through planting more trees. Increasingly mild and wet winters are likely to favour the development and survival of pathogen populations. Panellists stressed the need to apply science to find a solution, with the Minister drawing attention to a £25 million Defra-funded research project into two major tree diseases. Nevertheless, there was acknowledgment that it will be necessary to live with some future tree diseases, and their consequences.

The Forestry Commission and UK Government will now consider the contents of the report before making a decision on how to implement its recommendations.

The BES Policy Team last night attended a meeting and reception organised by the Chagos Environment Network, highlighting the importance of designating the Chagos Archipelago (otherwise known as the British Indian Ocean Territory, or ‘BIOT’) as a highly protected marine reserve. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office earlier this month announced a consultation on the formation of a Marine Protected Area in Chagos – which closes on 12 February.

Presentations from Professor Carl Lundin (IUCN) and Professor Charles Sheppard (Warwick University) highlighted the pristine marine environment of Chagos, whist Alastair Gammell, Pew Environment Group, encouraged all present to respond robustly to the UK Government’s consultation. Professor Lundin began by comparing the relative numbers of protected areas designated on land and at sea. Over the past 125 years, over 125,000 protected areas have been created on land; a relative success story. At sea however, despite many international commitments to create protected areas (Convention on Biological Diversity: designate 10% of signatories’ Exclusive Economic Zones as protected by 2010; World Parks Congress: designate 20% of the world’s oceans by 2020; OSPAR and the World Congress on Sustainable Development, for example), based on the current trajectory society is on in actually putting these into practice, we will not achieve the CBD targets until 2047 and the World Parks Congress targets until the 2080’s.

All speakers stressed that the Chagos offer an opportunity to achieve something which could not be achieved elsewhere; the conservation of a near-pristine coral reef system, largely removed from stressors such as pollution and over-fishing. Although climate change poses a severe risk to the reefs, the absence of these other stressors mean that the reef is more resilient to change: for example, in the severe coral reef bleaching event in 1998 (caused by the El Nino phenomenon), 50% of corals in Chagos died. However, now many are recovering: a recovery not seen elsewhere (for example in the Seychelles, where 98% of corals were killed through bleaching). Conserving the reefs now could ‘buy thirty years’, in the words of one of the speakers, in which fisheries outside the MPA would be supported, endangered species could find a haven and scientists could conduct vital research.

Introducing a Marine Protected Area in Chagos would allow scientists access to a fantastic resource, offering scope for exploration of the largely unstudied deep sea areas of the archipelago and offering a control site against which interventions to tackle degradation, and climate change, in other reef systems could be assessed. In addition, the Chagos sits on the Southern Equatorial current, so plays a vital role in re-stocking the fisheries and reefs of the Seychelles and Mauritius.

Despite these benefits, final comments from a representative of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office stressed that by no means was the designation of a Marine Protected Area in Chagos certain. He cautioned against the creation of a ‘paper park’, meaning that whatever is put in place must be adequately resourced and policed. The official did not quote a figure for how much this may cost, but acknowledged that greater resource than available in Chagos at the moment would be needed. The FCO consultation quotes a figure of £1 million – already at odds with the figure quoted by Alastair Gammell, during the discussion session, of £2 – 3 million. The legal status of Chagos – which is due to be ceded back to Mauritius when no longer needed for military purposes – and of the Chagossian people, awaiting a verdict from the European Court of Human Rights as to their right to return to their homeland, also create issues which the Government needs to manage extremely sensitively.

Nevertheless, the fact that the UK Government is consulting the scientific community and others about plans for a Marine Protected Area is a very positive step. Much of the content of the consultation came out of a meeting of the Chagos Conservation Network at the Royal Society earlier this year and the presence of officials from both Defra and FCO at the meeting last night was a positive sign. If the whole of Chagos was declared a Marine Protected Area this would increase by tenfold the areas held in MPAs in the Indian Ocean and if, additionally, the Chagos MPA were to be a ‘no-take’ zone, this would double the total area of the world’s oceans treated in this way; a fantastic legacy for the UK Government.

The report of the joint BES – UKBRAG (UK Biodiversity Research Advisory Group) workshop on ‘Developing the National Ecosystem Asssessment’ is now available to view on the BES website.

The workshop was held as a session at the BES Annual Meeting (University of Hertfordshire, 7 – 10 September 2009) and focused on bringing the UK National Ecosystem Assessment to the attention of BES members and others in the ecological science community. Presentations from the co-chair of the NEA and others were followed by discussion in break-out groups and a session reporting back to participants.

Key points to emerge from the report were: the need for the results of the NEA to be communicated to a broad audience, including the public, HM Treasury and for use in educational materials; the need for the NEA to be supported beyond the timescale currently proposed, to make sure that researchers and policy-makers are supported in efforts to use the outputs, and the need for the results of the NEA to drive future research priorities.

The Natural Capital Initiative, of which the BES is a founding member, is currently recruiting for a Science Policy Liaison Officer. The post-holder will be responsible for developing NCI projects, supporting the Steering Group and liaison between scientists and policy-makers.

The starting salary for the post, which will be based in the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, is £26,180 – £29,410. The post will be fixed term for 15 months.

The closing date is 8 December and interviews will take place on 15 December.

For further details, see the Natural Capital Initiative section of the BES website.

The Government has announced that the teaching of evolution will be a legal requirement in science teaching at primary schools from September 2011, although it will be left to schools to decide how it is done.

The new curriculum is to include a requirement “to investigate and explain how plants and animals are ‘interdependent’ and are diverse and adapted to their environment by natural selection”.

The move is particularly notable as it comes despite a drive to slim down the national curriculum for primary schools and leave teachers greater discretion over what to teach. The consultation on proposals to loosen the number of formal topics was however seen as an opportunity by scientific campaigners, and lead to a popular and successful e-petition to Downing Street calling for evolution to be included on the national curriculum.

The way in which the media communicates climate change to the public has come under scrutiny in the past, with controversies over the media providing an equal platform for both climate scientists and climate sceptics. A free event next week at the Science Museum’s Dana Centre will explore this and other issues in asking, ‘How do the UK media report climate change?’.

Tuesday 24 November, 19.00 – 20.45

Speakers
Robin Pagnamenta, Energy Editor, The Times
Tim Gallagher, Executive Producer, Sky News
Ben Jackson, Environment Editor, The Sun
James Randerson, Environment Website Editor, The Guardian

For details of how to register for this event (you must pre-book) see the Dana Centre website.

For details of the BES’s Press work see our Press Pages.

New research conducted under the EU-funded ALARM project (Assessing LArge scale environmental Risks for biodiversity with tested Methods) has identified land-use practices and agrochemical use as the main pressures causing a decline in pollinating insects, including bees, in Europe. It is estimated that 84% of European crop species depend on insect pollination to some extent.

The researchers analysed links between agriculture and pollinators using the ‘Driving forces – Pressures – State – Impact – Response’ (DPSIR) framework. They identified five major pressures on pollinators: land-use; agrochemicals; parasites/ diseases; competition between species (caused by humans) and climate change. Bees were the most affected by all of these pressures, apart from climate change, which had the greatest impact on butterflies.

EU land-use practices are driven most strongly by the CAP. Although environmental policies have recently become more integrated into the CAP, Agri-environment measures form only 8% of the total CAP budget to 2013; despite the influence of these schemes in supporting specific farming practices which protect the environment and maintain the countryside.

To boost pollinator numbers, the researchers call for an increase in the funding provided for agri-environment schemes under the CAP, for an increase in the areas of flower-rich natural grassland and croplands with leguminous plants and for a decrease in the use of agrochemicals, all of which would foster a greater diversity of organisms and landscapes, necessary for bee survival.

Orginal article: Science for Environment Policy

Original research: Kuldna, P., Peterson, K. Poltimäe, H. & Luig, J. (2009). An application of DPSIR framework to identify issues of pollinator loss. Ecological Economics. 69:32-42.

The BES ran an event at the British Science Festival in 2009, focused on bumblebees and the importance of providing a haven for pollinators in your garden. Find out more and see some of the press coverage we generated.

The Housing Minister, John Healey, yesterday announced that the UK Government is planning to abolish the need for planning permission in relation to wind turbines of up to 50ft in height, provided the turbine makes no more than 45 decibels of noise. This decision, which is open to consultation for three months, would allow wind turbines to be erected across farmland, and in industrial areas, around the UK and could boost renewable energy production. Safeguards will be put in place regarding location and impact on an area.

Under the proposals outlined yesterday, applications to erect solar panels on stadiums, schools, railway stations and offices would also be fast-tracked, whilst local councils would gain permission to install charging points for electric cars without the need for planning permission. A spokesman for the Department for Communities and Local Government stated that 30% of electricity could be generated from renewable sources by 2030.

Source article: John Healey unveils proposal to do away with planning permission for wind turbines, Times, 18 November 2009