The ‘arc of deforestation’ of southern Amazonia has one of the highest deforestation rates documented anywhere in the world. Landscape changes in a poorly studied but strategically important region in the Brazilian Amazon were studied using biennial Landsat TM/ETM+ images from 1984 to 2004. Deforestation rate for the period 1984–2004 was 2.47% yr−1 in the 7295 km2 study area, but decreased to 1.99% and 2.15% in 2000–2002 and 2002–2004, respectively. Landscape structure changes were characterized by smaller forest patches that were further apart, but increasingly complex in shape. Deforestation was mainly driven by cattle ranching, which in turn was affected by distance to roads, with forest cover increasing at greater distances from roads. A multi-layer perceptron was used to develop future scenarios based on Markov Chain analysis. Based on current land use, forest cover in the region will decline from 42% in 2004 to 21% by 2016. Results indicate a critical threshold at 51% of forest cover in which landscape structure and connectivity changes abruptly. This suggests that the region requires greater efforts in environmental law enforcement, land-use planning and education programmes to maintain the remaining forest cover near this threshold.

Natural areas are increasingly visited by people, and urban human visitors expect to watch wildlife as close as possible, but this may have associated disturbance costs. Here, effects of number of visitors and bird density on flight initiation distance (FID) as a proxy of disturbance vulnerability were evaluated in the large ground-nesting yellow-legged gull, Larus michahellis. Mean FID decreased with increasing number of visitors and with increasing gull densities, suggesting that (1) ground-nesting gulls habituate to massive human presence, while retaining their antipredatory mechanisms, and (2) dense groups of gulls were more reluctant to fly away. This density effect may be due to the increased risk of clutch predation by conspecifics at high densities and, if so, FID is a reliable metric of disturbance vulnerability in ground-nesting gulls. In conclusion, set-back distances are specific to local populations and it is unnecessary to ban or restrict human visits to ground-nesting gull colonies; redistributing visits, taking into account both the number of visitors and gull density, is preferable.

The dry grasslands of the Mediterranean Basin have been traditionally managed since ancient times, but have been drastically degraded by recent human activities such as cultivation. Cultivated plots in a dry grassland of Southern France were abandoned more than 20 years ago, but their vegetation and ground-active beetle community structure and composition differ considerably from neighbouring uncultivated grassland plots. Because these formerly cultivated plots are adjacent to an uncultivated grassland area, they constitute a model system for examining beetle recolonization patterns on field margins. No edge effect or ecotone was identified on the margins between two of the formerly cultivated plots and the uncultivated dry grassland; there was no significant peak of beetles species richness in this area. All the most common dry grassland beetle species (mainly saprophagous and predatory species, which are less habitat-specialist than phytophagous species) had already recolonized the formerly cultivated plots. However, although uncultivated dry grassland was adjacent to the formerly cultivated plots it was insufficient for complete regeneration of dry grassland beetle communities on formerly cultivated plots, indicating habitat quality remained lower even after 20 years. Understanding the causes of spatial variation in active-ground beetles at the species level is important before the ecological restoration of habitat quality to its prior state, using the adjacent steppe as a reference.

In Kenya, lands surrounding wildlife protected areas (PAs), referred to as dispersal areas, have undergone widespread land use changes, but these have been little studied. This study investigated impacts of different land use types on wildlife distribution and composition. Transect data from stratified random sampling based on land use and vegetation type were analysed using correlation and canonical correspondence analysis (CCA). Household density and cultivation intensity were negatively correlated with grass cover and were greatest on small-scale farms and lowest in a dedicated PA. Three patterns of wildlife distribution were identified. Wildlife density in communal grazing and the PA was significantly higher than on other land use types. While most wildlife used pastoral ranches in the wet season, larger herbivores moved to the PA during the dry season. Wildlife density along the grass cover gradient, which was a disturbance gradient, was dome shaped, indicating that wildlife tolerated moderate levels of disturbance. The primary factors influencing wildlife distribution were vegetation type and proximity to water sources in the dry and wet seasons, respectively. The apparent anomaly in the wet season is attributed to wildlife moving from Chyulu, which lacked seasonal ponds, to the lowland Masaai ranches, which had plenty of ponds. In both seasons, cattle density was the most important secondary factor. To mitigate declining wildlife trends, management should ensure a heterogeneity of vegetation types is maintained and wildlife retain access to seasonal water sources.

Excessive grazing by livestock is claimed to displace wild ungulates in the Trans-Himalaya. This study compares the seasonal diets and habitat use of sympatric wild naur Pseudois nayaur and domestic goat Capra hircus, sheep Ovis aries and free-ranging yak Bos grunniens in north Nepal and analyses their overlap both within and across seasons. Alpine meadow and the legumes Oxytropis and Chesneya were critical resources for all animal groups. High overlap occurred cross-seasonally when smallstock (sheep and goats) in summer used the spring and autumn ranges of naur. Relatively high total ungulate biomass (3028 kg km−2) and low recruitment of naur (56 young per 100 adult females in autumn) suggested interspecific competition. The spatio-temporal heterogeneity in composition and phenology of food plants across the steep gradient of altitude, together with rotational grazing, appears to indirectly facilitate coexistence of naur and smallstock. However, owing to high cross-seasonal (inter-seasonal) overlaps, competition is likely to occur between these two groups at high stocking densities. Within seasons, naur overlapped more with free-ranging yak than with smallstock. As their habitat use and diets were most similar in winter, when both fed extensively on the same species of shrubs, naur was most likely to compete with yak during that season.

The East China Sea (ECS) supports a highly productive fishery and is rich in biodiversity, but economic development in China and peripheral countries has led to intensifying anthropogenic impacts in the ECS. In response to this the Chinese government has introduced a range of marine spatial management measures. A spatial ecosystem model (Ecospace) of the ECS was developed to examine (1) the likely nature of trade-offs between fishery and conservation goals resulting from the marine protected areas (MPAs) and (2) possible trade-offs within the fishery sector resulting from the MPAs. The results suggest that overall the fishery has benefited from all of the simulated MPAs, whereas, although they defy categorical interpretation, effects of the MPAs on biodiversity and ecosystem structure are variable. Simultaneous application of several metrics of ecosystem status indicates that the perceived effect of an MPA on ecosystem status can depend on which metrics for ecosystem status are used, and how these metrics are interpreted. The simulations indicate that a fisheries and conservation outcome beneficial to all is possible, but not guaranteed, with the creation of an MPA. Total landings and profitability are predicted to have increased as a result of each of the MPAs, albeit at the cost of reduced landings and profits to some sectors of the fishery. This study demonstrates the benefits of the additional information relating to biodiversity, ecosystem structure and within fishery dynamics available from spatial ecosystem models compared to the single species models typically used to examine MPA effects. However, the use of a more complex ecosystem model introduces additional uncertainty in model interpretation.

Much research has focused on understanding the importance of forest environmental income in different communities and highlighting key socioeconomic characteristics of forest-dependent households. This paper examines the economic importance of forests among rural agriculturalists in Vietnam. Data were collected through a questionnaire survey of 104 households in five study villages in Ha Tinh province in north central Vietnam surrounding the Ke Go Nature Reserve (KGNR). Variables such as migration status of the household, age, income class and landholdings were used to identify characteristics of households with high forest income in both absolute and relative terms. More than half of households reported receiving forest environmental income in cash. Socioeconomic variables were compared between forest cash income (FCI) households and non-FCI households. Non-FCI households had more alternative income sources from wage labour and livestock, while FCI households were significantly younger, tended to live closer to the forest and had larger landholdings. Contrary to other research on forest use, the households deriving the most forest income in both absolute and relative terms were not the poorer households, but those in the middle class. These findings highlight the need for conservation and development projects to pay attention to the specific household factors that influence forest use, rather than relying on assumptions that poverty and forests are always linked.

Although small-scale agroforestry systems (swiddens, complex and single-crop-dominated agroforests, and homegardens) form a diverse and important tropical land use, there has been no attempt to collate information on their value for biodiversity. This paper reviews 52 published studies that compared species richness and/or abundance between agroforests and primary forest, and 27 studies that compared biodiversity parameters across agroforests. The former covered a broad range of taxa and geographical areas, but few focused on homegardens, while those comparing across agroforestry systems were biased towards studies of plants (21 studies) and homegardens (13 of 27). Of 43 studies comparing species richness or diversity across habitats, 34 reported lower richness in agroforests than in adjacent forest. There was also high β diversity between primary forests and agroforests. Patterns of abundance shifts were less straightforward, with many species traits (for example diets) being generally poor indicators of response to agricultural disturbance. Among the few trends identified, restricted-range or rare species, and terrestrial and some understorey vertebrates tended to decline most, and open country species, granivores and generalists increased most in agroforests. Variability in biodiversity retention across systems has been linked most strongly to economic function, management intensity and extent of remnant forest within the landscape, as well as more subtle cultural influences. Species richness and abundance generally decrease with increasing prevalence of crop species, more intensive management, decreasing stratum richness and shortening of cultivation cycles. Increasing holding size did not necessarily reduce α diversity. Knowledge of the general effects of small-scale agroforestry on biodiversity is substantial, but the great diversity of systems and species responses mean that it is difficult to accurately predict biodiversity losses and gains at a local level. Further work is required on the influence of spatial and temporal structure of agricultural holdings on biodiversity retention across agriculture/succession/forest mosaics, how β diversity across individual holdings influences biodiversity across landscapes, and ultimately on how agricultural intensification can be best managed to minimize future losses of biodiversity from tropical landscapes.

Bioregionalism claims that interaction between the biophysical and human components of a region generates place-based environmental and social understanding and concern, which lead to locally shared power and responsibility in cooperative land management and governance. The Man and the Biosphere Programme's Seville Strategy calls for local community participation in a multi-stakeholder ecosystem-based approach to conservation, but it is unclear if tenets of bioregionalism play a role in its implementation. Bookmark Biosphere Reserve (BBR) in Australia has substantially succeeded in scientific research and monitoring, conservation, environmental education and sustainable land-use initiatives. Aspects of bioregionalism (for example recognition of the region's unique identity, local community sense of responsibility, integration of local knowledge, presence of motivated local leaders and cooperative community-based management through a network of groups) have contributed to success. Other crucial factors were funding, technical and scientific information and support from government agencies, leadership from members of state and federal government and from private philanthropic foundations, community capacity-building for sustainable land management and availability of volunteers from outside the region. Nevertheless, conflict arose in relation to governance, originating from the recognized difficulties of reconciling a diversity of allegiances, motivations, management styles and personalities, and resulted in division of BBR into two, one section being managed largely through the private sector and community volunteers, the other (renamed Riverland Biosphere Reserve) coordinated by a committee with more diverse affiliations. Bioregionalism can play a role in biosphere reserves but motivations and resources of external public and private organizations are also vital. Avoiding weaknesses of bioregional approaches requires greater attention to social aspects of environmental management. Governance structures and processes need to be inclusive, flexible and equitable in decision making and access to funds. They should support both agency and community-initiated activities and include conflict resolution mechanisms.