- Author: Kat Kerlin
The cool of the forest is a welcome escape on a hot day. This is especially true for mammals in North America's hottest regions, according to a study from the University of California, Davis. The study indicates that, as the climate warms, preserving forest cover will be increasingly important for wildlife conservation.
The study, published today in the journal PNAS, found that North American mammals — from pumas, wolves and bears to rabbits, deer and opossums — consistently depend on forests and avoid cities, farms and other human-dominated areas in hotter climes. In fact, mammals are, on average, 50% more likely to occupy forests than open habitats in hot regions. The opposite was true in the coldest regions.
“Different populations of the same species respond differently to habitat based on where they are,” said lead author Mahdieh Tourani, who conducted the study while a postdoctoral researcher at UC Davis and is now an assistant professor of quantitative ecology at the University of Montana, Missoula. “Climate is mediating that difference.”
Tourani points to the eastern cottontail as an example. The study showed the common rabbit preferred forests in hotter areas while preferring human-dominated habitat, such as agricultural areas, in colder regions.
Not one-size-fits-all
Her example illustrates “intraspecific variation,” which the study found to be pervasive across all North America's mammals. This runs contrary to a longstanding practice in conservation biology of categorizing species as those that live well alongside people and those that don't. The authors say there is growing recognition of ecological flexibility, and that species are more complicated than those two categories suggest.
“We can't take a one-size-fits all approach to habitat conservation,” said senior author Daniel Karp, a UC Davis associate professor in the Department of Wildlife, Fish and Conservation Biology. “It turns out climate has a large role in how species respond to habitat loss.”
For example, if elk are managed under the assumption that they can only live in protected areas, then conservation managers may miss opportunities to conserve them in human-dominated landscapes.
“On the other hand, if we assume a species will always be able to live alongside us, then we might be wasting our effort trying to improve the conservation value of human-dominated landscapes in areas where it is simply too hot for the species,” Karp said.
A pathway for conservation
For the study, the authors leveraged Snapshot USA, a collaborative monitoring program with thousands of camera trap locations across the country.
“We analyzed 150,000 records of 29 mammal species using community occupancy models,” Tourani said. “These models allowed us to study how mammals respond to habitat types across their ranges while accounting for the fact that species may be in an area, but we did not record their presence because the species is rare or elusive.”
The study provides a pathway for conservation managers to tailor efforts to conserve and establish protected areas, as well as enhance working landscapes, like farms, pastures and developed areas.
“If we're trying to conserve species in working landscapes, it might behoove us to provide more shade for species,” said Karp, whose recent study about birds and climate change drew a similar conclusion, with forests providing a protective buffer against high temperatures. “We can maintain patches of native vegetation, scattered trees, and hedgerows that provide local refugia for wildlife, especially in places that are going to get warmer with climate change.”
Additional co-authors included Rahel Sollmann of the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, Roland Kays of North Carolina State University and North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, Jorge Ahumada of Conservation International and Arizona State University, and Eric Fegraus of Conservation International.
The study was funded by Conservation International.
This story was originally posted on UC Davis News and Events. Find media resources below.
Media Contacts:
- Mahdieh Tourani, UC Davis/University of Montana, mahdieh.tourani@umt.edu
- Daniel Karp, UC Davis Wildlife, Fish and Conservation Biology, dkarp@ucdavis.edu
- Kat Kerlin, UC Davis News and Media Relations, 530-750-9195, kekerlin@ucdavis.edu
- Author: Anne E Schellman
Why Not Move Firewood?
By bringing wood from home, you can unknowingly spread invasive pests and diseases that can harm trees. This includes dry, aged, and seasoned wood. Once you arrive at your destination, pests can emerge from the firewood and spread to the trees and forests where you camp. Invasive and hard-to-control pests kill several million native trees every year, causing environmental and economic problems.
Did you Know?
New infestations of tree-killing insects and diseases are often found in campgrounds and parks as a result of campers moving firewood!
This trip, tell your friends and family why you aren't bringing firewood. For more information about firewood pests and resources for finding good firewood, visit the Don't Move Firewood web site. To learn about many of the invasive wood-boring pests and associated diseases and problems, visit the UC IPM web site.
First posted on August 30, 2021
Anne Schellman has been the Coordinator for the Stanislaus County Master Gardeners since 2018.
/h4>/h4>- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The seminar will take place in 122 Briggs Hall. The Zoom link is https://ucdavis.zoom.us/j/99515291076.
BosWash Megalopolis is the heavily populated area extending from Boston to Washington and including New York City, Philadelphia, and Baltimore.
"The temperate deciduous forest biome covers about 5 percent of the Earth's surface, but is home to 25 percent of the human population," D'Amico says in his abstract. "Once a huge tract of forested land, this area now consists of many thousands of small, heterogenous forests. Research in the FRAME (FoRests Among Managed Ecosystems) program is conducted over a network of permanent forest sites in the BosWash Megalopolis of the U.S. East Coast, to answer ecological questions at many trophic levels. I will discuss the results of some of this research."
FRAME researchers target temperate deciduous forests in the Anthropocene age, a current geological age viewed as the period during which human activity has been the dominant influence on climate and the environment.
From the website: "Our current work includes experimental and observational studies of soil and key species to understand interactions between plants, invertebrates, and vertebrates. Other research is focused on monitoring, manipulations aimed directly at site improvement, and technology transfer for better management of urban forest fragments. As of 2022, there are 60 FRAME sites in MA, PA, DE, MD and NC."
Among D'Amico's publications:
- Conceptualizing social-ecological drivers of change in urban forest patches, published in August 2021 in Urban Ecosytems
- Local landscapes and microhabitat characteristics are important determinants of urban–suburban forest bee communities, published in October 2019 in Ecosphere
- Lawn mowing frequency in suburban areas has no detectable effect on Borrelia spp. vector Ixodes scapularis (Acari: Ixodidae), published in April 2019 in PLOS-ONE
- Urban forest fragments buffer trees from warming and pests, published in March 2019 in Science of the Total Enfironment
A 25-year research entomologist with USDA, D'Amico joined in February, 1997. He has served on the adjunct faculty of the University of Delaware since 2001. His expertise includes ecosystems ecology, urban ecology an invasion ecology. D'Amico received his bachelor's degree in biology in 1989, and his doctorate from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
The Wednesday seminars are coordinated by nematologist Shahid Siddique, assistant professor, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology. For technical issues, contact ssiddique@ucdavis.edu.
/span>- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Yes, says UC Davis alumnus and research ecologist John Mola and his colleagues in a newly published article, "The Importance of Forests in Bumble Bee Biology and Conservation," the cover story in the current edition of the journal Bioscience.
"Forests are often critical bumble bee habitat," wrote Mola, a U.S. Geological Survey Mendenhall Postdoctoral Fellow based at the Fort Collins Science Center, Colorado, and a former member of the Neal Williams laboratory, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology. He authored the research article with colleagues Jeremy Hemberger, a postdoctoral researcher in the Williams lab; Jade Kochanski of the University of Wisconsin, Madison; Leif Richardson of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation; and UC Davis alumnus Ian Pearse of the Fort Collins Science Center.
The cover image by Diego Delso shows a Bombus terrestris, a buff-tailed bumble bee that is one of the most numerous bumble bee species in Europe. He captured the image on a pink mulla mulla, Ptilotus exaltatus, in Estonia.
The abstract:
"Declines of many bumble bee species have raised concerns because of their importance as pollinators and potential harbingers of declines among other insect taxa. At present, bumble bee conservation is predominantly focused on midsummer flower restoration in open habitats. However, a growing body of evidence suggests that forests may play an important role in bumble bee life history. Compared with open habitats, forests and woody edges provide food resources during phenologically distinct periods, are often preferred nesting and overwintering habitats, and can offer favorable abiotic conditions in a changing climate. Future research efforts are needed in order to anticipate how ongoing changes in forests, such as overbrowsing by deer, plant invasions, and shifting canopy demographics, affect the suitability of these habitats for bumble bees. Forested habitats are increasingly appreciated in the life cycles of many bumble bees, and they deserve greater attention from those who wish to understand bumble bee populations and aid in their conservation."
"Despite their lower numerical abundance, recent studies have shown that these phases of bumble bee life history are especially important in determining the trajectory of their populations (Crone and Williams 2016, Carvell et al. 2017)," they wrote. "Because forests in many regions contrast with open habitats in terms of their flowering phenology, structural features, and abiotic conditions, these habitats may be particularly relevant to the understudied portions of the bumble bee life cycle. When considering the bumble bee year more broadly to include early floral resources or nesting and overwintering habitat, the role of forests, forest edges, and other woody habitats becomes more central in our understanding of bumble bee biology."
They concluded: "We hope our perspective does not provide the idea that forests are required for bumble bees but instead that they offer a cost effective means to provide foraging, nesting, and overwintering habitats that are compatible with conservation goals of other organisms (Williams 2011, Bentrup et al. 2019) and may be overlooked in studies of bumble bee biology. A recurrent problem in bumble bee conservation is the lack of informed demographic models or an understanding of basic aspects of species biology (i.e., nesting and overwintering). Increasing our capacity to incorporate forests into these efforts is likely to produce rich data sets that better inform conservation efforts and lead to the development of useful demographic models."
Active in bumble bee research, Mola is an invited participant on both the Western Bumble Bee Species Status Assessment Expert Group and the Native Bee Monitoring Research Coordination Network, and is also an organizing member (since 2020) of BOMBUSS: Building Our Methods by Using Sound Science.
"The BOMBUSS mission," according to its website, "is to bring researchers working on bumble bee biology together to discuss the methodologies currently used to investigate these important pollinators. As domestication of bumble bees has expanded worldwide, so has research on this group of bees as model organisms for study, as crop pollinators, and as conservation targets. The growth of this field of study has been rapid, prompting the organizers to convene this meeting to discuss the need and potential for standardization of methods."
BOMBUSS goals are five-fold:
- to identify the areas where common methodology already exists,
- identify areas where best practices can be suggested,
- identify gaps in the literature regarding methodology,
- share knowledge and build networks for advancing our science,
- formulate plans to address the gaps through peer-reviewed publication.
Mola received his doctorate in ecology in 2019 from UC Davis. He presented his exit seminar on "Bumble Bee Movement Ecology and Response to Wildfire."
At UC Davis, Mola was a Professors for the Future Fellow, receiving a year of professional development and pedagogical training. His honors also include a 2013-2018 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship of $133,500 and a 2014-2016 UC Davis Graduate Group in Ecology Fellowship of $43,000. He won the graduate student research poster competition at the 2018 UC Davis Bee Symposium for his work on "Bumble Bee Movement and Landscape Genetics."
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
A $4.6 million grant to UC Merced and UC Irvine will help UC Agriculture and Natural Resources researchers develop new tools and methods for California land owners to better manage the state's forests, shrub lands and grasslands.
California's Strategic Growth Council agreed to fund the Innovation Center for Advancing Ecosystem Climate Solutions, a three-year program co-led by UC Merced Professor Roger Bales and UC Irvine Professor Michael Goulden. The money comes through California Climate Investments, a statewide initiative that puts billions of cap-and-trade dollars to work
The goals include reducing wildfire risk, improving long-term carbon sequestration and bolstering resilience in the face of climate change, with an emphasis on California's rural regions and low-income communities.
“Our part of the project is to work with stakeholders and identify areas where we can focus management practices to promote healthy forests, minimize wildfires, improve water security and increase carbon sequestration,” said Toby O'Geen, UC Cooperative Extension soil resource specialist at UC Davis.
“Right now, many of California's forests, shrub lands and grasslands are carbon sources, and we need to change them into carbon sinks,” said Bales, director of the Sierra Nevada Research Institute and distinguished professor of engineering. “Our research will address information bottlenecks to guide decision making, build local capacity for science-based land management and develop methods for translating benefits of land restoration into financing for land restoration.”
California's recent drought, tree die-offs, wildfires and rising temperatures all point to the necessity of improved forest stewardship, Goulden said.
“Officials in the state government and agencies recognize this need, but uncertainty over how to proceed has sometimes slowed progress,” he said.
Most of the work will be conducted by scientists at Merced and Irvine, but collaborators from UC Berkeley, UC Davis, Stanford University, San Diego State University and the University of California Division of Agricultural and Natural Resources, as well as state agencies, will play important roles.
“This research will enable UC Cooperative Extension advisors to provide better advice to land managers to reduce the severity of wildfires,” said Glenda Humiston, UC vice president for agriculture and natural resources. “Severe wildfires are not only releasing greenhouse gases, but polluting the air of many communities, aggravating the health of people in less-affluent, inland areas such as Tulare, Yuba and Mariposa counties.”
At UC Merced, an interdisciplinary group of researchers from two departments — Civil & Environmental Engineering and Management of Complex Systems — will collaborate with UC Cooperative Extension and engage with local stakeholders. The group will study and identify the most-effective land-management practices, in terms of water conservation, forest health, fire resistance and carbon capture.
“We will develop the spatial data and analysis tools to plan landscape restoration, develop local capacity for better managing the state's wildlands in a warming climate, and enumerate the greenhouse gas and other benefits from investments in land management,” Bales said.
Goulden, professor of Earth systems science, said UC Irvine researchers will use a big-data approach to analyze observations collected by satellites since the 1980s to measure the efficacy of thousands of past and ongoing forest treatments, while UC Merced takes a different approach.
“We will work with groups in rural communities to systematically evaluate how well, or poorly, our products can support decision making,” Bales said, “and then develop both implementation pathways and policy recommendations to better and more-quickly implement landscape-restoration and carbon-capture projects across the state.”
Because there are critical gaps in the understanding of carbon cycles, uptake by forests and negative feedback from climate change, this project initiative has been established to develop new knowledge through measurements and modeling. Researchers will synthesize the resulting data to produce actionable information for stakeholders.
Bales and Goulden agreed the Innovation Center will target low-risk, high-yield opportunities to reduce California's greenhouse-gas contributions.
Just a small improvement in management efficiency will have meaningful benefits — on the order of several million metric tons of CO2 per year, Goulden said.
The program will also benefit low-income communities in the state by reducing wildfire risk, which disproportionately impacts poorer areas in California; by maintaining water quantity through better vegetation management; by fostering tourism in disadvantaged locales; and by preparing students in these areas for careers in sustainability and climate resilience.