TY - JOUR

T1 - Covariation in population trends and demography reveals targets for conservation action

AU - Morrison, Catriona A.

AU - Butler, Simon J.

AU - Robinson, Robert A.

AU - Clark, Jacquie A.

AU - Arizaga, Juan

AU - Aunins, Ainars

AU - Baltà, Oriol

AU - Cepák, Jaroslav

AU - Chodkiewicz, Tomasz

AU - Escandell, Virginia

AU - Foppen, Ruud P. B.

AU - Gregory, Richard D.

AU - Husby, Magne

AU - Jiguet, Frédéric

AU - Kålås, John Atle

AU - Lehikoinen, Aleksi

AU - Lindström, Åke

AU - Moshøj, Charlotte M.

AU - Nagy, Károly

AU - Nebot, Arantza Leal

AU - Piha, Markus

AU - Reif, Jiří

AU - Sattler, Thomas

AU - Škorpilová, Jana

AU - Szép, Tibor

AU - Teufelbauer, Norbert

AU - Thorup, Kasper

AU - van Turnhout, Chris

AU - Wenninger, Thomas

AU - Gill, Jennifer A.

N1 - Funding Information: Data accessibility. The datasets supporting this article can be obtained from Dryad Digital Repository: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad. 76hdr7svs [33]. Authors’ contributions. C.A.M., S.J.B., R.A.R., J.A.C. and J.A.G. conceived and wrote the study; C.A.M. performed the analysis and all other authors provided the data and commented on the manuscript. Competing interests. We declare we have no competing interests. Funding. This study was funded by NERC (project NE/L007665/1 and NE/T007/354/1). A.Le. was funded by the Academy of Finland (grant no. 275606), J.R. by project PRIMUS/17/SCI/16 and J.C. by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic (DKRVO 2018/15, National Museum, 00023272). Acknowledgements. This study was made possible by strong Pan-European collaborations and friendships and is the result of thousands of hours of fieldwork by dedicated volunteers. We thank all the volunteers of the national monitoring and ringing schemes; the Latvian Nature Conservation Agency, Spanish Ornithological Society (SEO/ BirdLife), Norwegian Climate and Environment Ministry, Norwegian Environment Agency, Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, Centre for Animal Movement Research (CAnMove) and Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in a Changing Climate (BECC), Austrian Ministry for Sustainability and Tourism, the RSPB and JNCC (on behalf of Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Authors.

PY - 2021

Y1 - 2021

N2 - Wildlife conservation policies directed at common and widespread, but declining, species are difficult to design and implement effectively, as multiple environmental changes are likely to contribute to population declines. Conservation actions ultimately aim to influence demographic rates, but targeting actions towards feasible improvements in these is challenging in widespread species with ranges that encompass a wide range of environmental conditions. Across Europe, sharp declines in the abundance of migratory landbirds have driven international calls for action, but actions that could feasibly contribute to population recovery have yet to be identified. Targeted actions to improve conditions on poor-quality sites could be an effective approach, but only if local conditions consistently influence local demography and hence population trends. Using long-term measures of abundance and demography of breeding birds at survey sites across Europe, we show that co-occurring species with differing migration behaviours have similar directions of local population trends and magnitudes of productivity, but not survival rates. Targeted actions to boost local productivity within Europe, alongside large-scale (non-targeted) environmental protection across non-breeding ranges, could therefore help address the urgent need to halt migrant landbird declines. Such demographic routes to recovery are likely to be increasingly needed to address global wildlife declines.

AB - Wildlife conservation policies directed at common and widespread, but declining, species are difficult to design and implement effectively, as multiple environmental changes are likely to contribute to population declines. Conservation actions ultimately aim to influence demographic rates, but targeting actions towards feasible improvements in these is challenging in widespread species with ranges that encompass a wide range of environmental conditions. Across Europe, sharp declines in the abundance of migratory landbirds have driven international calls for action, but actions that could feasibly contribute to population recovery have yet to be identified. Targeted actions to improve conditions on poor-quality sites could be an effective approach, but only if local conditions consistently influence local demography and hence population trends. Using long-term measures of abundance and demography of breeding birds at survey sites across Europe, we show that co-occurring species with differing migration behaviours have similar directions of local population trends and magnitudes of productivity, but not survival rates. Targeted actions to boost local productivity within Europe, alongside large-scale (non-targeted) environmental protection across non-breeding ranges, could therefore help address the urgent need to halt migrant landbird declines. Such demographic routes to recovery are likely to be increasingly needed to address global wildlife declines.

KW - conservation

KW - demography

KW - migration

KW - population trends

KW - productivity

U2 - 10.1098/rspb.2020.2955

DO - 10.1098/rspb.2020.2955

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 33653129

AN - SCOPUS:85102325846

VL - 288

JO - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

JF - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

SN - 0962-8452

IS - 1946

M1 - 20202955

ER -