53 posts · 39,402 views
A conservation ecologist working on ways to improve the fate of the world's biodiversity, including that of the self-destructive Homo sapiens.
ConservationBytes
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- May 4, 2010
- 11:00 PM
- 2,632 views
Who are the world’s biggest environmental reprobates?
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Everyone is a at least a little competitive, and when it comes to international relations, there could be no higher incentive for trying to do better than your neighbours than a bit of nationalism (just think of the Olympics). We rank the world’s countries for pretty much everything, relative wealth, health, governance quality and even [...]... Read more »
Bradshaw, C.J.A., Giam, X., & Sodhi, N.S. (2010) Evaluating the Relative Environmental Impact of Countries. PLoS ONE, 5(5). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0010440
- April 28, 2010
- 11:11 AM
- 1,725 views
Global rates of forest loss – everyone’s a bastard
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
I’ve written rather a lot about rates of forest loss around the world, including accumulated estimates of tropical forest loss and increasing fragmentation/loss in the boreal forest (see Bradshaw et al. 2009 Front Ecol Evol & Bradshaw et al. 2009 Trends Ecol Evol). For the tropics in particular, we used the index that an area [...]... Read more »
Hansen, M., Stehman, S., & Potapov, P. (2010) Quantification of global gross forest cover loss. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0912668107
- June 27, 2010
- 08:05 AM
- 1,667 views
Faraway fettered fish fluctuate frequently
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Hello! I am Little Fish Swimming in the Sea. I have lots of fishy friends. Come along with me. (apologies to Lucy Cousins and Walker Books) I have to thank my 3-year old daughter and one of her favourite books for that intro. Now to the serious stuff. I am very proud to announce a [...]... Read more »
Mellin, C., Huchery, C., Caley, M.J., Meekan, M.G., & Bradshaw, C.J.A. (2010) Reef size and isolation determine the temporal stability of coral reef fish populations. Ecology, 2147483647. DOI: 10.1890/10-0267.1
- October 13, 2009
- 10:05 AM
- 1,121 views
Life and death on Earth: the Cronus hypothesis
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Bit of a strange one for you today, but here’s a post I hope you’ll enjoy.
My colleague, Barry Brook, and I recently published a paper in the very new and perhaps controversial online journal , the Journal of Cosmology. Cosmology? According the journal, ‘cosmology’ is:
“the study and understanding of existence in its totality, encompassing the [...]... Read more »
Bradshaw, C.J.A., & Brook, B.W. (2009) The Cronus Hypothesis - extinction as a necessary and dynamic balance to evolutionary diversification . Journal of Cosmology, 201-209. info:other/http://journalofcosmology.com/Extinction100.html
- November 10, 2009
- 01:35 AM
- 1,071 views
Susceptibility of sharks, rays and chimaeras to global extinction
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Quite some time ago my colleague and (now former) postdoctoral fellow, Iain Field, and I sat down to examine in gory detail the extent of the threat to global populations of sharks, rays and chimaeras (chondrichthyans). I don’t think we quite realised the mammoth task we had set ourselves. Several years and nearly a hundred [...]... Read more »
I.C. Field, M.G. Meekan, R.C. Buckworth, & C.J.A. Bradshaw. (2009) Susceptibility of Sharks, Rays and Chimaeras to Global Extinction. Advances in Marine Biology, 275-363. info:/10.1016/S0065-2881(09)56004-X
- October 5, 2009
- 08:48 PM
- 1,064 views
Connectivity paradigm in extinction biology
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
I’m going to do a double review here of two papers currently online in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. I’m lumping them together because they both more or less challenge the pervasive conservation/restoration paradigm that connectivity is the key to reducing extinction risk. It’s just interesting (and slightly amusing) that the two [...]... Read more »
Franzen, M., & Nilsson, S. (2009) Both population size and patch quality affect local extinctions and colonizations. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2009.1584
Griffen, B., & Drake, J. (2009) Environment, but not migration rate, influences extinction risk in experimental metapopulations. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2009.1153
- September 30, 2009
- 09:57 PM
- 1,056 views
Protecting Australian wilderness
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Today I highlight a new paper just out online in Diversity and Distributions by James Watson and colleagues: Wilderness and future conservation priorities in Australia. It’s certainly one for the Potential list.
Australia has a pretty bad biodiversity conservation track record – we have some of the worst mammal extinction trends in the world, and we’ve [...]... Read more »
Watson, J., Fuller, R., Watson, A., Mackey, B., Wilson, K., Grantham, H., Turner, M., Klein, C., Carwardine, J., Joseph, L.... (2009) Wilderness and future conservation priorities in Australia. Diversity and Distributions. DOI: 10.1111/j.1472-4642.2009.00601.x
- October 21, 2009
- 09:09 AM
- 940 views
Sleuthing the Chinese green slime monster
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
I just returned from a week-long scientific mission in China sponsored by the Australian Academy of Science, the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. I was invited to attend a special symposium on Marine and Deltaic Systems where research synergies between Australian and Chinese scientists were to be [...]... Read more »
Liu, D., Keesing, J., Xing, Q., & Shi, P. (2009) World’s largest macroalgal bloom caused by expansion of seaweed aquaculture in China. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 58(6), 888-895. DOI: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2009.01.013
- January 11, 2010
- 10:45 PM
- 940 views
Computer-assisted killing for conservation
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Many non-Australians might not know it, but Australia is overrun with feral vertebrates (not to mention weeds and invertebrates). We have millions of pigs, dogs, camels, goats, buffalo, deer, rabbits, cats, foxes and toads (to name a few). In a continent that separated from Gondwana about 80 million years ago, this allowed a fairly unique [...]... Read more »
C.R. McMahon, B.W. Brook,, N. Collier, & C.J.A. Bradshaw. (2010) Spatially explicit spreadsheet modelling for optimising the efficiency of reducing invasive animal density. Methods in Ecology and Evolution. info:/10.1111/j.2041-210X.2009.00002.x
Albrecht, G., McMahon, C., Bowman, D., & Bradshaw, C. (2009) Convergence of Culture, Ecology, and Ethics: Management of Feral Swamp Buffalo in Northern Australia. Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, 22(4), 361-378. DOI: 10.1007/s10806-009-9158-5
Bradshaw, C., Field, I., Bowman, D., Haynes, C., & Brook, B. (2007) Current and future threats from non-indigenous animal species in northern Australia: a spotlight on World Heritage Area Kakadu National Park. Wildlife Research, 34(6), 419. DOI: 10.1071/WR06056
- February 2, 2011
- 07:20 PM
- 923 views
Colour-blind sharks
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
A few weeks ago I was interviewed on Channel 10 (Adelaide) about some new research coming out of the University of Western Australia regarding shark colour vision. I’ve received permission from Channel 1o to reproduce the news snippet here. The first bloke interviewed is Associate Professor Nathan Hart, the study‘s lead author. I’m the bald [...]... Read more »
Hart, N., Theiss, S., Harahush, B., & Collin, S. (2011) Microspectrophotometric evidence for cone monochromacy in sharks. Naturwissenschaften. DOI: 10.1007/s00114-010-0758-8
- November 21, 2009
- 12:41 AM
- 878 views
Greenwash, blackwash: two faces of conservation evil
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Beware false prophets, and especially those masquerading as conservationists (or at least ‘green’) when they are not, in fact, doing anything for conservation at all. But this blog site isn’t about typical greenie evil-corporation-making-a-mess-of-the-Earth sermons (there are plenty of those); it’s instead about real conservation science that has/should/could have a real biodiversity benefits. This is [...]... Read more »
Koh, L., Ghazoul, J., Butler, R., Laurance, W., Sodhi, N., Mateo-Vega, J., & Bradshaw, C. (2009) Wash and Spin Cycle Threats to Tropical Biodiversity. Biotropica. DOI: 10.1111/j.1744-7429.2009.00588.x
- April 13, 2011
- 01:30 PM
- 877 views
Getting conservation stakeholders involved
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Here’s another guest post from another switched-on Queensland student, Duan Biggs. Duan, originally from Namibia and South Africa, is doing his PhD at the ARC Centre for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University in Townsville, Queensland. His PhD is investigating the resilience of nature-based tourism to climate change. I’ve met Duan a few times, and [...]... Read more »
Biggs, D., Abel, N., Knight, A., Leitch, A., Langston, A., & Ban, N. (2011) The implementation crisis in conservation planning: could “mental models” help?. Conservation Letters. DOI: 10.1111/j.1755-263X.2011.00170.x
- December 3, 2009
- 11:19 PM
- 851 views
Scoping the future threats and solutions to biodiversity conservation
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Way back in 1989, Jared Diamond defined the ‘evil quartet’ of habitat destruction, over-exploitation, introduced species and extinction cascades as the principal drivers of modern extinctions. I think we could easily update this to the ‘evil quintet’ that includes climate change, and I would even go so far as to add extinction synergies as a [...]... Read more »
Sutherland, W., Clout, M., Côté, I., Daszak, P., Depledge, M., Fellman, L., Fleishman, E., Garthwaite, R., Gibbons, D., & De Lurio, J. (2009) A horizon scan of global conservation issues for 2010. Trends in Ecology . DOI: 10.1016/j.tree.2009.10.003
- January 18, 2010
- 10:24 PM
- 820 views
No chance Europe will recover fish stocks
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Alternate title: When pigs fly and fish say ‘hi’.
I’m covering a quick little review of a paper just published online in Fish and Fisheries about the two chances Europe has of meeting its legal obligations of rebuilding its North East Atlantic fish stocks by 2015 (i.e., Buckley’s and none).
The paper entitled Rebuilding fish stocks no [...]... Read more »
Froese, R., & Proelß, A. (2010) Rebuilding fish stocks no later than 2015: will Europe meet the deadline?. Fish and Fisheries. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-2979.2009.00349.x
Pitcher, T., Kalikoski, D., Pramod, G., & Short, K. (2009) Not honouring the code. Nature, 457(7230), 658-659. DOI: 10.1038/457658a
- October 9, 2009
- 10:22 AM
- 801 views
Managing for extinction
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Ah, it doesn’t go away, does it? Or at least, we won’t let it.
That concept of ‘how many is enough?’ in conservation biology, the so-called ‘minimum viable population size‘, is enough to drive some conservation practitioners batty.
How many times have we heard the (para-) phrase: “It’s simply impractical to bring populations of critically endangered species [...]... Read more »
Traill, L.W., Brook, B.W., Frankham, R.R., & Bradshaw, C.J.A. (2009) Pragmatic population viability targets in a rapidly changing world. Biological Conservation. DOI: 10.1016/j.biocon.2009.09.001
- May 3, 2010
- 09:45 AM
- 789 views
Fanciful mathematics and ecological fantasy
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Bear with me here, dear reader – this one’s a bit of a stretch for conservation relevance at first glance, but it is important. Also, it’s one of my own papers so I have the prerogative :-) As some of you probably know, I dabble quite a bit in population dynamics theory, which basically means [...]... Read more »
Clark, F., Brook, B.W., Delean, S., Reşit Akçakaya, H., & Bradshaw, C.J.A. (2010) The theta-logistic is unreliable for modelling most census data. Methods in Ecology and Evolution. DOI: 10.1111/j.2041-210X.2010.00029.x
- July 6, 2010
- 09:36 AM
- 766 views
Killing us slowly
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
I’m currently attending the 2010 International Congress for Conservation Biology in Edmonton, Canada. I thought it would be good to tweet and blog my way through on topics that catch my attention. This is my second post from the conference. – I silently scoffed inside when the plenary speaker was being introduced. It was boldly claimed that [...]... Read more »
Hayes, T., Collins, A., Lee, M., Mendoza, M., Noriega, N., Ali Stuart, A., & Vonk, A. (2002) Hermaphroditic, demasculinized frogs after exposure to the herbicide atrazine at low ecologically relevant doses. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 99(8), 5476-5480. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.082121499
Hayes, T., Haston, K., Tsui, M., Hoang, A., Haeffele, C., & Vonk, A. (2002) Herbicides: Feminization of male frogs in the wild. Nature, 419(6910), 895-896. DOI: 10.1038/419895a
HAYES, T. (2004) There Is No Denying This: Defusing the Confusion about Atrazine. BioScience, 54(12), 1138. DOI: 10.1641/0006-3568(2004)054[1138:TINDTD]2.0.CO;2
Fan, W., Yanase, T., Morinaga, H., Gondo, S., Okabe, T., Nomura, M., Komatsu, T., Morohashi, K., Hayes, T., Takayanagi, R.... (2007) Atrazine-Induced Aromatase Expression Is SF-1 Dependent: Implications for Endocrine Disruption in Wildlife and Reproductive Cancers in Humans. Environmental Health Perspectives, 115(5), 720-727. DOI: 10.1289/ehp.9758
- March 15, 2011
- 12:30 PM
- 750 views
Classics: demography versus genetics
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
Here’s another short, but sweet Conservation Classic highlighted in our upcoming book chapter (see previous entries on this book). Today’s entry comes from long-time quantitative ecology guru, Russ Lande, who is now based at the Silwood Park Campus (Imperial College London). – In an influential review, Lande (1988) argued that “…demography may usually be of more [...]... Read more »
Lande, R. (1988) Genetics and demography in biological conservation. Science, 241(4872), 1455-1460. DOI: 10.1126/science.3420403
- April 12, 2010
- 10:16 AM
- 742 views
The maggot of the plant world – mangroves
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
I don’t know how many of my readers have waded through a mangrove swamp before – if you have, you’ll know it’s no ‘walk in the park’. They are generally mosquito-infested with waist-deep mud, have more creepy-crawlies than you can poke a stick at, and in some places (such as my former stomping ground, the [...]... Read more »
Polidoro, B., Carpenter, K., Collins, L., Duke, N., Ellison, A., Ellison, J., Farnsworth, E., Fernando, E., Kathiresan, K., Koedam, N.... (2010) The Loss of Species: Mangrove Extinction Risk and Geographic Areas of Global Concern. PLoS ONE, 5(4). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0010095
- January 7, 2010
- 08:59 PM
- 739 views
The elusive Allee effect
by CJA Bradshaw in ConservationBytes
In keeping with the theme of extinctions from my last post, I want to highlight a paper we’ve recently had published online early in Ecology entitled Limited evidence for the demographic Allee effect from numerous species across taxa by Stephen Gregory and colleagues. This one is all about Allee effects - well, it’s all about how difficult it is [...]... Read more »
Gregory, S., Bradshaw, C.J.A., Brook, B.W., & Courchamp, F. (2009) Limited evidence for the demographic Allee effect from numerous species across taxa. Ecology, 2147483647. DOI: 10.1890/09-1128
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