Key information needs to move from knowledge to action for biodiversity conservation in Canada

Buxton, Rachel T.; Bennett, Joseph; Reid, Andrea J.; Shulman, Charles; Cooke, Steven J.; Francis, Charles M.; Nyboer, Elizabeth A.; Pritchard, Gary A.; Binley, Allison D.; Avery‐Gomm, Stephanie; Ban, Natalie C.; Beazley, Karen F.; Bennett, Elena M.; Blight, Louise K.; Bortolotti, Lauren E.; Camfield, Alaine F.; Gadallah, Fawziah; Jacob, Aerin L.; Naujokaitis‐Lewis, Ilona; Raudsepp‐Hearne, Ciara; Roche, Dominique G.; Soulard, François; Stralberg, Diana; Sadler, Kella Darleen; Solarik, Kevin A.; Ziter, Carly; Brandt, J.P.; McKindsey, Christopher W.; Greenwood, David A.; Boxall, Peter C.; Ngolah, Cyprian F.; Chan, Kai M. A.; Lapen, David R.; Poser, Scott; Girard, Judith; DiBacco, Claudio; Hayne, Shari; Orihel, Diane M.; Lewis, Doug; Littlechild, Danika Billie; Marshall, Shawn J.; McDermott, Larry; Whitlow, Rod; Browne, David R.; Sunday, Jennifer M.; Smith, Paul A.

doi:10.1016/j.biocon.2021.108983

Cited by 48 publications

(35 citation statements)

References 57 publications

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“…Indeed, a recent analysis in Canada suggested that although lack of knowledge about the status of biodiversity was important, the most significant barrier to conservation action were mechanisms to translate knowledge to action (Buxton et al 2021). Some actions can be undertaken without explicit knowledge about the state of all aspects of biodiversity.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The alarming state of freshwater biodiversity in Canada

Desforges

Clarke

Harmsen

et al. 2022

Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci.

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Little is known about the current state of freshwater biodiversity in Canada, one of the countries with the greatest amount of surface waters in the world. To address this knowledge gap, we compiled a list of all available assessments of conservation status for freshwater species (over 3,000 taxa) and further evaluated the overall status of six distinct taxonomic groups, focusing on organisms reliant on freshwaters [i.e., aquatic plants, invertebrates (with a focus on freshwater mussels), fishes, herpetofauna (reptiles and amphibians), birds, and mammals]. Overall, 11.7% of all freshwater species of plants and animals assessed were found to be ‘at risk’ (i.e., listed as ‘Threatened’, ‘Endangered’, or ‘Extirpated’) and 17.9% identified as ‘Special Concern’. We found that 37.9% of species lacked sufficient data to enable their status to be assessed. Data gaps in Canada’s assessment of its freshwater species were most prevalent in invertebrates (excluding freshwater mussels). Given the alarming state of freshwater biodiversity in Canada, we conclude by providing recommendations that focus on evaluating temporal trends and informing conservation actions.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The alarming state of freshwater biodiversity in Canada

Desforges

Clarke

Harmsen

et al. 2022

Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci.

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“…In our application, we focused on the mammals of Canada. The upside of this approach is that information at the country level is likely to be required by policy makers and stakeholders for their biodiversity assessment, as each country tends to set goals at the national level (Buxton et al 2021) for which quantitative instruments are designed (Turak et al 2017), with specific strategies often enacted at smaller scales (Ray, Grimm, and Olive 2021). Yet these national divisions, in large parts of the world, reflect nothing except for the legacy of settler colonialism, and operating under them must be done under the clear realization that they contributed to the ongoing biodiversity crisis (Adam 2014), can reinforce environmental injustice (Choudry 2013;Domínguez and Luoma 2020), and on Turtle Island especially, will probably end up being replaced by Indigenous principles of land management (Eichhorn, Baker, and Griffiths 2019;No'kmaq et al 2021).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Food web reconstruction through phylogenetic transfer of low-rank network representation

Strydom¹,

Bouskila²,

Banville³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Despite their importance in many ecological processes, collecting data and information on ecological interactions, and therefore species interaction networks, is an exceedingly challenging task. For this reason, large parts of the world have a deficit of data of which species interact, and what we can expect the network structure of these interactions to be. As data collection alone is unlikely to be sufficient at filling these global gaps, community ecologists must adopt predictive methods. In this contribution we develop such a method, relying on graph embedding (the extraction of explanatory latent variables from known graph structures) and transfer learning (the application of previous solution to novel problems with limited predictors overlap) in order to assemble a predicted list of trophic interactions between mammals of Canada. This interaction list is derived from extensive knowledge of the mammalian food web of Europe, despite the fact that there are fewer than 5% of common species between the two locations. We provide guidance on how this method can be adapted by substituting some approaches or predictors in order to make it more generally applicable to a broad family of ecological problems.

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“…Urgent calls for increased protection of freshwater ecosystems and biodiversity include free-flowing rivers (Perry et al, 2021), river-wetland mosaics (Reis et al, 2017), springs (Cantonati et al, 2020) and other groundwater-dependent ecosystems, as well as integrated terrestrial-freshwater-estuary/marine protection coordinated across spatial scales, jurisdictions and sectors (Abell et al, 2017;Leal et al, 2020;Buxton et al, 2021). Systematic conservation planning offers data-driven methods for prioritizing restoration and protected area strategies (Abell et al, 2017;Linke et al, 2019).…”

Section: Proteced Area Design and Managementmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recent reviews consistently call for improved practices to enhance communication, understanding and respect for different "ways of knowing, " and methods for blending of stakeholder knowledge (especially indigenous knowledge) with conventional science (Anderson et al, 2019;Buxton et al, 2021;Maasri et al, 2021;Perry et al, 2021). Others call for evidence-based and targeted guidance to facilitate working with the complex dynamic interactions of ecological and societal systems (Harper et al, 2021).…”

Section: Socio-ecological Science and Governancementioning

confidence: 99%

“…An Emergency Recovery Plan for freshwater biodiversity, published by 25 authors from 14 organizations (Tickner et al, 2020), sets out six major priorities for global action and policy development to "bend the curve of freshwater biodiversity loss." It has been submitted to the working committees of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework, and further promoted as a dramatic OUPblog "Bring living waters back to our planet 5 " Comprehensive reviews have since enumerated many research questions, actions and policy refinements needed to "bend the curve" and protect the world's freshwater ecosystems (van Rees et al, 2020;Buxton et al, 2021;Harper et al, 2021;Maasri et al, 2021). Each review cuts across important scientific, societal, management and policy issues.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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