Walking in STEP: Lessons for linking spatial prioritisations to implementation strategies

Spatial prioritisations are increasingly being undertaken to allocate the investment of limited conservation resources. These techniques are highly effective at identifying where important areas for conservation are located, but of limited use for deciding how implementation of conservation action should be undertaken. Conservation planning should be a collaborative social process, and necessitates that spatial prioritisations be complemented with an implementation strategy. We undertook a conservation planning initiative in the Subtropical Thicket biome in South Africa, complementing a spatial prioritisation with an implementation strategy. Believing strongly in the importance of developing a ‘safe-fail’ culture in conservation, we detail our activities and document our successes and failures. We synthesize lessons from our experience of collaboratively developing an implementation strategy with stakeholders, so as to ensure it effectively complements a spatial prioritisation.     

Land managers’ willingness-to-sell defines conservation opportunity for protected area expansion

Spatial prioritization techniques are increasingly applied in the design of protected area networks, which are regarded as the cornerstone of nature conservation efforts. These techniques are becoming ever more sophisticated, but are still founded primarily upon biological data. A common assumption made in most spatial prioritizations is that land throughout a planning region is available for acquisition. We interviewed land managers in the Eastern Cape province, South Africa, and mapped their willingness-to-sell their land using a psychometric analytical technique. We examined the, (i) degree to which vegetation type targets are achieved across a planning region, (ii) areal and cost efficiency, and (iii) spatial configuration, of candidate protected areas identified as important for achieving conservation targets. We found that only 10 out of 48 land managers were willing-to-sell their land. Only seven, five and one of the 19 vegetation types, respectively, could achieve their conservation targets of 10%, 30% and 50% when unwilling land managers were removed from the analysis. Assuming unwilling land managers could be convinced to sell if offered a premium price, the cost of acquiring all lands was between 6.20% and 30.67% more expensive than 2006 land prices. Accounting for implementation opportunities and constraints, such as land manager willingness-to-sell, not simply identifying biological priorities, is of fundamental importance for ensuring spatial prioritizations deliver maps with the potential to usefully guide expansion of protected area networks which can be feasibly implemented.     

Modeling the Exchanges of Energy, Water, and Carbon Between Continents and the Atmosphere

Atmospheric general circulation models used for climate simulation and weather forecasting require the fluxes of radiation, heat, water vapor, and momentum across the land-atmosphere interface to be specified. These fluxes are calculated by submodels called land surface parameterizations. Over the last 20 years, these parameterizations have evolved from simple, unrealistic schemes into credible representations of the global soil-vegetation-atmosphere transfer system as advances in plant physiological and hydrological research, advances in satellite data interpretation, and the results of large-scale field experiments have been exploited. Some modern schemes incorporate biogeochemical and ecological knowledge and, when coupled with advanced climate and ocean models, will be capable of modeling the biological and physical responses of the Earth system to global change, for example, increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide.     

Detection and Characterization of the Cumulene Carbenes H2C5 and H2C6

Two cumulene carbenes, H2C5 and H2C6, were detected in a supersonic molecular beam by Fourier transform microwave spectroscopy. Their rotational and leading centrifugal distortion constants were determined with high accuracy, such that the entire radio spectrum can now be calculated. Like the known carbenes H2C3 and H2C4, both molecules have singlet electronic ground states and linear carbon-chain backbones. They can be produced in sufficiently high concentrations in the laboratory that their electronic spectra, expected to lie in the visible, should be readily detectable by laser spectroscopy. The microwave spectra of other, more exotic isomers may be detectable as well.     

Oviposition and Larval Habitat Preferences of the Saltwater Mosquito, Aedes vigilax, in a Subtropical Mangrove Forest in Queensland, Australia

Abstract Our aim was to investigate the oviposition and larval habitats of the saltwater mosquito Aedes vigilax (Skuse) (Diptera: Culicidae) in a mangrove forest system in subtropical Queensland, Australia. Eggshells (indicators of oviposition) and larvae were sampled in three habitat classes that were depicted in a schematic model. Two classes were in depressions or basins, either with hummocks or dense pneumatophore substrates, both of which retained water after tidal flooding. The third class was in freely flushed mangroves that corresponded with more frequent tidal connections than the depression classes. ANOVA and Tukey-Kramer tests were used to analyze the data. The null hypotheses were rejected: the hummock class was a significant habitat based on both eggshell and larval data. The conclusion was that mosquito production in the mangrove system was distributed unevenly between habitat classes, and that the hummock class had conditions suited to the requirements of the immature stages of Ae. vigilax. This research has the potential to inform mosquito management strategies by focusing treatment on the problem habitats and underpinning habitat modifications including reducing water retention in the basins.     

An Economic Analysis of the Potential for Precision Farming in UK Cereal Production

The results from alternative spatial nitrogen application studies are analysed in economic terms and compared to the costs of precision farming hardware, software and other services for cereal crops in the UK. At current prices, the benefits of variable rate application of nitrogen exceed the returns from a uniform application by an average of £22 ha⁻¹ The cost of the precision farming systems range from £5 to £18 ha⁻¹ depending upon the system chosen for an area of 250 ha. The benefits outweigh the associated costs for cereal farms in excess of 80 ha for the lowest price system to 200–300 ha for the more sophisticated systems. The scale of benefits obtained depends upon the magnitude of the response to the treatment and the proportion of the field that will respond. To be cost effective, a farmed area of 250 ha of cereals, where 30% of the area will respond to variable treatment, requires an increase in crop yield in the responsive areas of between 0·25 and 1.00 t ha⁻¹ (at £65 t⁻¹) for the basic and most expensive precision farming systems, respectively.     

The Current State of Solar Modeling

Data from the Global Oscillation Network Group (GONG) project and other helioseismic experiments provide a test for models of stellar interiors and for the thermodynamic and radiative properties, on which the models depend, of matter under the extreme conditions found in the sun. Current models are in agreement with the helioseismic inferences, which suggests, for example, that the disagreement between the predicted and observed fluxes of neutrinos from the sun is not caused by errors in the models. However, the GONG data reveal subtle errors in the models, such as an excess in sound speed just beneath the convection zone. These discrepancies indicate effects that have so far not been correctly accounted for; for example, it is plausible that the sound-speed differences reflect weak mixing in stellar interiors, of potential importance to the overall evolution of stars and ultimately to estimates of the age of the galaxy based on stellar evolution calculations.     

Linking long-term dietary patterns with gut microbial enterotypes

Diet strongly affects human health, partly by modulating gut microbiome composition. We used diet inventories and 16S rDNA sequencing to characterize fecal samples from 98 individuals. Fecal communities clustered into enterotypes distinguished primarily by levels of Bacteroides and Prevotella. Enterotypes were strongly associated with long-term diets, particularly protein and animal fat (Bacteroides) versus carbohydrates (Prevotella). A controlled-feeding study of 10 subjects showed that microbiome composition changed detectably within 24 hours of initiating a high-fat/low-fiber or low-fat/high-fiber diet, but that enterotype identity remained stable during the 10-day study. Thus, alternative enterotype states are associated with long-term diet.