13 14Large dams cause extensive inundation of habitats, with remaining terrestrial habitat confined to 15 highly fragmented archipelagos of land-bridge islands comprised of former hilltops. Isolation of 16 biological communities on reservoir islands induces local extinctions and degradation of remnant 17 communities. "Good practice" dam development guidelines propose using reservoir islands for 18 species conservation, mitigating some of the detrimental impacts associated with flooding terrestrial 19 habitats. The degree of species retention on islands in the long-term, and hence, whether they are 20 effective for conservation is currently unknown. Here, we quantitatively review species' responses to 21 isolation on reservoir islands. We specifically investigate island species richness in comparison with 22 neighbouring continuous habitat, and relationships between island species richness and island area, 23 isolation time, and distance to mainland and to other islands. Species' responses to isolation on 24 reservoir islands have been investigated in only 15 of the >58 000 large-dam reservoirs (dam height 25 >15 m) operating globally. Research predominantly originates from wet tropical forest habitats and 26 focuses on mammals, with species richness being the most widely-reported ecological metric. 27Terrestrial taxa are, overall, negatively impacted by isolation on reservoir islands. Reservoir island 28 species richness declines with isolation time, and although the rate of loss is slower on larger islands, 29 all islands exhibit depauperate species richness <100 years after isolation, compared to continuous 30 mainland habitats. Such a pattern of sustained and delayed species loss following large-scale habitat 31 disturbance is indicative of an extinction debt existing for reservoir island species: this pattern is 32 evident across all taxonomic groups and dams studied. Thus, reservoir islands cannot reliably be used 33 for species conservation as part of impact mitigation measures, and should instead be included in area 34 calculations for land impacted by dam creation. Environmental licensing assessments as a 35 precondition for future dam development should explicitly consider the long-term fate of island 36 communities when assessing biodiversity loss vs energy output. 37 38

Above-and belowground carbon stocks are decoupled in secondary tropical forests and are positively related to forest age and soil nutrients respectively. Science of the Total Environment, 697, 133987 Above-and belowground carbon stocks are decoupled in secondary tropical forests and are positively related to forest age and soil nutrients respectively

Management strategy evaluation (MSE) is a powerful tool for simulating all key aspects of natural resource management under conditions of uncertainty. We present the r package generalised management strategy evaluation (GMSE), which applies genetic algorithms to provide a generalised tool for simulating adaptive decision‐making management scenarios between stakeholders with competing objectives under complex social‐ecological interactions and uncertainty. GMSE models can be agent‐based and spatially explicit, incorporating a high degree of realism through mechanistic modelling of links and feedbacks among stakeholders and with the ecosystem; additionally, user‐defined sub‐models can also be incorporated as functions into the broader GMSE framework. We show how GMSE simulates a social‐ecological system using the example of an adaptively managed waterfowl population on an agricultural landscape; simulated waterfowl exploit agricultural land, causing conflict between conservation interests and the interest of food producers maximising their crop yield. The r package GMSE is open source under GNU Public License; source code and documents are freely available on GitHub.

Habitat degradation through anthropogenic development is a key driver of biodiversity loss. One way to compensate losses is “biodiversity offsetting” (wherein biodiversity impacted is “replaced” through restoration elsewhere). A challenge in implementing offsets, which has received scant attention in the literature, is the accurate determination of residual biodiversity losses. We explore this challenge for offsetting gas extraction in the Ustyurt Plateau, Uzbekistan. Our goal was to determine the landscape extent of habitat impacts, particularly how the footprint of “linear” infrastructure (i.e. roads, pipelines), often disregarded in compensation calculations, compares with “hub” infrastructure (i.e. extraction facilities). We measured vegetation cover and plant species richness using the line-intercept method, along transects running from infrastructure/control sites outward for 500 m, accounting for wind direction to identify dust deposition impacts. Findings from 24 transects were extrapolated to the broader plateau by mapping total landscape infrastructure network using GPS data and satellite imagery. Vegetation cover and species richness were significantly lower at development sites than controls. These differences disappeared within 25 m of the edge of the area physically occupied by infrastructure. The current habitat footprint of gas infrastructure is 220 ± 19 km2 across the Ustyurt (total ∼ 100,000 km2), 37 ± 6% of which is linear infrastructure. Vegetation impacts diminish rapidly with increasing distance from infrastructure, and localized dust deposition does not conspicuously extend the disturbance footprint. Habitat losses from gas extraction infrastructure cover 0.2% of the study area, but this reflects directly eliminated vegetation only. Impacts upon fauna pose a more difficult determination, as these require accounting for behavioral and demographic responses to disturbance by elusive mammals, including threatened species. This study demonstrates that impacts of linear infrastructure in regions such as the Ustyurt should be accounted for not just with respect to development sites but also associated transportation and delivery routes.

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