When deciding how to conserve biodiversity, practitioners navigate diverse missions, sometimes conflicting approaches, and uncertain trade‐offs. These choices are based not only on evidence, funders’ priorities, stakeholders’ interests, and policies, but also on practitioners’ personal experiences, backgrounds, and values. Calls for greater reflexivity—an individual or group's ability to examine themselves in relation to their actions and interactions with others—have appeared in the conservation science literature. But what role does reflexivity play in conservation practice? We explored how self‐reflection can shape how individuals and groups conserve nature. To provide examples of reflexivity in conservation practice, we conducted a year‐long series of workshop discussions and online exchanges. During these, we examined cases from the peer‐reviewed and gray literature, our own experiences, and conversations with 10 experts. Reflexivity among practitioners spanned individual and collective levels and informal and formal settings. Reflexivity also encompassed diverse themes, including practitioners’ values, emotional struggles, social identities, training, cultural backgrounds, and experiences of success and failure. Reflexive processes also have limitations, dangers, and costs. Informal and institutionalized reflexivity requires allocation of limited time and resources, can be hard to put into practice, and alone cannot solve conservation challenges. Yet, when intentionally undertaken, reflexive processes might be integrated into adaptive management cycles at multiple points, helping conservation practitioners better reach their goals. Reflexivity could also play a more transformative role in conservation by motivating practitioners to reevaluate their goals and methods entirely. Reflexivity might help the conservation movement imagine and thus work toward a better world for wildlife, people, and the conservation sector itself.

The human populations of the Brazilian semiarid region interact strongly with the avifauna throughout the entire occupation of its territory. These interactions were established in a context of adverse edaphoclimatic conditions that limited crop production and socioeconomic welfare, making the uses of birds as food and income frequent excuses to label them as important subsistence resources. It is relevant to know whether such interactions today are still influenced by socioeconomic factors and in what way. Semistructured questionnaires were applied to 105 residents, 45 men and 60 women, in rural communities of Casa Nova, Bahia state. Correlation analysis and regression models were performed to verify how the socioeconomic variables 'gender', 'age', 'education', 'monthly income' and 'residence time' of respondents explain the variation in the number of known species and the acknowledgement of the ecological importance of the birds. There were 840 bird citations, corresponding to 60 species. A correlation between age, income, residence time in the region and the number of species mentioned arouse, but there was no correlation with the acknowledgement of the ecological importance of the species. Men cited significantly more bird species than women. The results also indicate a low level of knowledge about bird species among younger populations. Socioeconomic factors strongly influence people's knowledge of bird species in their region. Exposure to wild birds and experience with it, gender, education and income together influence the knowledge about the diversity of this group.

People's acceptability for wildlife, stakeholders' engagement and involvement are acknowledged as key factors for the success of wildlife reintroduction projects. We analyzed the main National Action Plans (NAPs) (the Brazilian management participatory instrument for the conservation of endangered species) for eight bird species and conducted an online questionnaire with researchers and practitioners involved in those species reintroduction programs. The assessment of the main Brazilian bird's reintroduction programs showed that, in general, efforts have been made to integrate local people into it. Nevertheless, the actions were disconnected, isolated and fragmented. A formal protocol, designed, discussed and approved by experts aiming to address the human dimensions (HD) of human-bird interactions (HBI), preferably to be used in each stage of the reintroduction programs, was not found. Actions considered related to human dimensions are mainly under the umbrella of environmental education interventions or campaigns, more directed to children and youth; correspond to activities performed by locals with the birds and/or captive birds facilities; or, fostering artcraft production or bird watching activities. The weak or sometimes absent human dimensions approach to this important conservation tool may indicate either the novelty for Brazilian researchers and managers of the science of human dimensions within the field of wildlife management or the lack of dialogue between natural and social sciences when wildlife conservation is at stake. Reintroductions are expensive, sensitive, and labor-intensive processes. It becomes necessary due the conservation status of the species and its implementation follows a careful research of biological, ecological and socio-institutional regional background that identifies the drivers of species extinction and plans according to it. Understanding and predicting people's behaviors and its triggers are paramount to successful reintroduction projects. Thus, making use of well-planned HD studies in HBI may be the watershed between success or failure of reintroduction programs. This study was a pioneer initiative of its kind and it aimed to provide sound recommendations for managers, researchers and practitioners to acknowledge the relevance of HD and its core role in the reintroduction of endangered bird species.

Exclusively Brazilian, the Caatinga is a seasonally dry tropical forest where the endangered jaguar (Panthera onca) and puma (Puma concolor) co-occur with the lowest regional Human Development Indexes. New land uses challenge traditional livelihoods and add threats to species historically poached in retaliation for livestock depredation. Chronicle biodiversity conflicts became acute after a reported increase in depredation allegedly because of those changes and conflicts among stakeholders. Using the framework of human dimensions of wildlife management, pioneer research on the vulnerabilities of rural communities to jaguar-and-puma conflicts was led in ‘Boqueirão da Onça’, within and surrounding that polygon of protected areas. The aim was to identify, describe, understand, and predict human behaviour, and link the outcomes with the IUCN natural resources governance concept. Negative attitudes arose from 72% and 35.2% participants towards the proximity of jaguar and proximity of puma, respectively. When asked about institutions working for wildlife protection, and institutions working for people facing problems caused by carnivores, 64.9% and 88.8%, respectively, were unaware of them. Regarding beliefs about co-occurrence with jaguars or pumas, 80.9% and 82.9%, respectively, mentioned more problems than benefits, with 74.5% believing in the increase of both species’ populations due to the creation of protected areas. This scenario may ease jaguar and puma to become scapegoats for human-wildlife and broader social conflicts, unless values such as justice and transparency are pursued.