Ecological determinants of butterfly vulnerability across the European continent

Essens, Tijl; Langevelde, Frank van; Vos, Rutger A.; Swaay, Chris van; WallisDeVries, Michiel F.

doi:10.1007/s10841-017-9972-4

Cited by 37 publications

(45 citation statements)

References 89 publications

(88 reference statements)

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“…We have to acknowledge here, that species were selected by experts in a time (1992) when the EU was much smaller than it is today. Furthermore, despite of existing shortcomings identified for the Habitats Directive, the selection of species listed on the annexes has been modified and improved during the past years (see for critical comments also Cardoso, ; Maes et al ., ; Essens et al ., ). Nevertheless, in our eyes, coining species mostly existing outside of the reference area is not fulfilling the goal of selecting the most appropriate species for nature conservation prioritization in that particular area.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

What makes a species a priority for nature conservation?

Habel

Goßner

Schmitt

2019

Animal Conservation

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Prioritizing species for nature conservation should follow objective ecologically and biogeographically meaningful selection criteria. In this study, we test an approach to prioritize butterfly species for nature conservation considering the following parameters: (1) geographical distribution and endemicity, (2) vulnerability and (3) ecological specialization. Following these criteria, we identified 51 species of conservation priority out of the 403 European species assessed, that is 12.7%. This list of species and those included in the annexes II and IV of the Habitats Directive (92/43/EEC) had only four species in common. The species selected by both approaches differed significantly in their traits considering their distribution and ecological specialization with the annexes of the EU Habitats Directive including many species that are neither range-restricted nor have their core distribution within Europe, and furthermore many not threatened ecological generalists. Our results suggest that species prioritization for nature conservation should follow objective criteria, such as distribution and ecological specialization. 28Animal Conservation 23 (2020) 28-35 ª

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

What makes a species a priority for nature conservation?

Habel

Goßner

Schmitt

2019

Animal Conservation

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“…In most instances, there was a crucial distinction between species inhabiting oceanic and continental ranges. Essens et al (2017) demonstrated that for European butterflies, climatic traits and life-history traits have a comparably large influence on species vulnerability, pointing to a crucial role of climatically extreme locations for conservation. Such locations host disproportionate numbers of vulnerable species and may be particularly sensitive to climate change.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Phenology responses of temperate butterflies to latitude depend on ecological traits

2019

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Global change influences species’ seasonal occurrence, or phenology. In cold‐adapted insects, the activity is expected to start earlier with a warming climate, but contradictory evidence exists, and the reactions may be linked to species‐specific traits. Using data from the GBIF database, we selected 105 single‐brooded Holarctic butterflies inhabiting broad latitudinal ranges. We regressed patterns of an adult flight against latitudes of the records, controlling for altitude and year effects. Species with delayed flight periods towards the high latitudes, or stable flight periods across latitudes, prevailed over those that advanced their flight towards the high latitudes. The responses corresponded with the species’ seasonality (flight of early season species was delayed and flight of summer species was advanced at high latitudes) and oceanic vs. continental climatic niches (delays in oceanic, stability in continental species). Future restructuring of butterfly seasonal patterns in high latitudes will reflect climatic niches, and hence the evolutionary history of participating species.

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“…To account for potentially confounding effects of phylogenetic relatedness among the moth species, we used an ultrametric tree that included our 481 species (Essens, Van Langevelde, Vos, Van Swaay, & WallisDeVries, ; Mutanen et al., , Supplementary Material 2) and included the phylogenetic correlation matrix implied by this tree in the linear model using generalized least squares (GLS) of the “nlme” package in R (Pinheiro et al., ) to test whether there were differences in population trends between the groups of moths in relation to (1) phototaxis (attracted, occasionally attracted and not attracted to light) or (2) adult circadian rhythm (active as adult during the day, night or both day and night). The GLS was followed by the Tukey–Kramer post hoc test (using the “multcomp” package in R, Hothorn, Bretz, & Westfall, ).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Declines in moth populations stress the need for conserving dark nights

Langevelde

Braamburg-Annegarn

Huigens

et al. 2018

Global Change Biology

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Given the global continuous rise, artificial light at night is often considered a driving force behind moth population declines. Although negative effects on individuals have been shown, there is no evidence for effects on population sizes to date. Therefore, we compared population trends of Dutch macromoth fauna over the period 1985-2015 between moth species that differ in phototaxis and adult circadian rhythm. We found that moth species that show positive phototaxis or are nocturnally active have stronger negative population trends than species that are not attracted to light or are diurnal species. Our results indicate that artificial light at night is an important factor in explaining declines in moth populations in regions with high artificial night sky brightness. Our study supports efforts to reduce the impacts of artificial light at night by promoting lamps that do not attract insects and reduce overall levels of illumination in rural areas to reverse declines of moth populations.

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Ecological determinants of butterfly vulnerability across the European continent

Cited by 37 publications

References 89 publications

What makes a species a priority for nature conservation?

What makes a species a priority for nature conservation?

Phenology responses of temperate butterflies to latitude depend on ecological traits

Declines in moth populations stress the need for conserving dark nights

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