Physiological and immunological responses of birds and mammals to forest degradation: A meta-analysis

Messina, Simone; Edwards, David P.; Eens, Marcel; Costantini, David

doi:10.1016/j.biocon.2018.06.002

Cited by 28 publications

(26 citation statements)

References 78 publications

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“…Vampire bats Desmodus rotundus in more agricultural habitats also had stronger BKA, instead likely signalling improved defence from more food through abundant livestock prey (Becker, Czirják, Volokhov, et al, 2018; Table 1). Given that these similar patterns can stem from distinct environmental mechanisms, data-driven syntheses to assess how anthropogenic habitats influence immunity across spatial scales are especially needed (Messina, Edwards, Eens, & Costantini, 2018).…”

Section: Anthropogenic Factorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…More generally, whereas ecoimmunology research on species-level heterogeneity has begun to integrate across studies (e.g. Brace et al, 2017;Downs, Schoenle, Han, Harrison, & Martin, 2019), work on environmental heterogeneity has largely remained idiosyncratic (however, see Morand et al, 2010 andMessina et al, 2018).…”

Section: Future D Irec Ti On S For Macroimmunologymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Macroimmunology: The drivers and consequences of spatial patterns in wildlife immune defence

Becker

Albery

Kessler

et al. 2020

Journal of Animal Ecology

118

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The prevalence and intensity of parasites in wild hosts varies across space and is a key determinant of infection risk in humans, domestic animals and threatened wildlife. Because the immune system serves as the primary barrier to infection, replication and transmission following exposure, we here consider the environmental drivers of immunity. Spatial variation in parasite pressure, abiotic and biotic conditions, and anthropogenic factors can all shape immunity across spatial scales. Identifying the most important spatial drivers of immunity could help pre‐empt infectious disease risks, especially in the context of how large‐scale factors such as urbanization affect defence by changing environmental conditions. We provide a synthesis of how to apply macroecological approaches to the study of ecoimmunology (i.e. macroimmunology). We first review spatial factors that could generate spatial variation in defence, highlighting the need for large‐scale studies that can differentiate competing environmental predictors of immunity and detailing contexts where this approach might be favoured over small‐scale experimental studies. We next conduct a systematic review of the literature to assess the frequency of spatial studies and to classify them according to taxa, immune measures, spatial replication and extent, and statistical methods. We review 210 ecoimmunology studies sampling multiple host populations. We show that whereas spatial approaches are relatively common, spatial replication is generally low and unlikely to provide sufficient environmental variation or power to differentiate competing spatial hypotheses. We also highlight statistical biases in macroimmunology, in that few studies characterize and account for spatial dependence statistically, potentially affecting inferences for the relationships between environmental conditions and immune defence. We use these findings to describe tools from geostatistics and spatial modelling that can improve inference about the associations between environmental and immunological variation. In particular, we emphasize exploratory tools that can guide spatial sampling and highlight the need for greater use of mixed‐effects models that account for spatial variability while also allowing researchers to account for both individual‐ and habitat‐level covariates. We finally discuss future research priorities for macroimmunology, including focusing on latitudinal gradients, range expansions and urbanization as being especially amenable to large‐scale spatial approaches. Methodologically, we highlight critical opportunities posed by assessing spatial variation in host tolerance, using metagenomics to quantify spatial variation in parasite pressure, coupling large‐scale field studies with small‐scale field experiments and longitudinal approaches, and applying statistical tools from macroecology and meta‐analysis to identify generalizable spatial patterns. Such work will facilitate scaling ecoimmunology from individual‐ to habitat‐level insights about the drivers of immu...

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Section: Anthropogenic Factorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Future D Irec Ti On S For Macroimmunologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Macroimmunology: The drivers and consequences of spatial patterns in wildlife immune defence

Becker

Albery

Kessler

et al. 2020

Journal of Animal Ecology

118

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“…Indeed, a meta‐analysis of physiological responses of birds and mammals to habitat disturbance revealed consistent changes in stress hormones in response to habitat degradation (Messina et al. ). An urban eastern grey kangaroo's home range is estimated at between 20 and 100 ha (Brunton et al.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Kangaroos may also experience higher stress during periods of urban construction where the habitat is continuously disturbed. Indeed, a meta-analysis of physiological responses of birds and mammals to habitat disturbance revealed consistent changes in stress hormones in response to habitat degradation (Messina et al 2018). An urban eastern grey kangaroo's home range is estimated at between 20 and 100 ha (Brunton et al 2018b, Henderson et al 2018, similar to that for kangaroos in most non-urban settings (Jaremovic and Croft 1987, 1991, Moore et al 2002.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Noninvasive hormone analysis techniques have provided a method for assessing the health of wildlife populations by measuring physiological responses to anthropogenic changes in their environment (Wikelski and Cooke , Messina et al. ). The relationship between physiological stress, wildlife disease, and population demography is complex (Hing et al.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Not all urban landscapes are the same: interactions between urban land use and stress in a large herbivorous mammal

Brunton

Clemente

Burnett

2020

Ecological Applications

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Urbanization significantly impacts the health and viability of wildlife populations yet it is not well understood how urban landscapes differ from non‐urban landscapes with regard to their effects on wildlife. This study investigated the physiological response of eastern grey kangaroos (Macropus giganteus) to land use at a landscape scale. Using fecal glucocorticoid metabolites (FGM) we compared stress levels of kangaroo populations in urban and non‐urban environments. We modeled FGM concentrations from 24 kangaroo populations against land use (urban or non‐urban) and other anthropogenic and environmental factors, using a linear modeling approach. We found that land use was a significant predictor of FGM concentrations in eastern grey kangaroos with significant differences in concentrations between urban and non‐urban populations. However, the direction of the relationship differed between northern and southern regions of Australia. In the northern study sites, kangaroos in urban areas had significantly higher FGM levels than their non‐urban counterparts. In contrast, in southern sites, where kangaroos occur in high densities in many urban areas, urban kangaroos had lower FGM concentrations than non‐urban kangaroos. Rainfall and temperature were also significant predictors of FGM and the direction of the relationship was consistent across both regions. These results are consistent with the contrasting abundance and persistence of kangaroo populations within the urban matrix between the two study regions. In the northern region many populations have declined over the last two decades and are fragmented, also occurring at lower densities than in southern sites. Our study indicates that it is the characteristics of urban environments, rather than the urban environment per se, which determines the extent of impacts of urbanization on kangaroos. This research provides insights into how the design of urban landscapes can influence large mammal populations.

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Tropical forest loss impoverishes arboreal mammal assemblages by increasing tree canopy openness

Cudney‐Valenzuela

Arroyo‐Rodríguez

Morante‐Filho

et al. 2022

Ecological Applications

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Landscape‐scale deforestation poses a major threat to global biodiversity, not only because it limits habitat availability, but also because it can drive the degradation of the remaining habitat. However, the multiple pathways by which deforestation directly and indirectly affects wildlife remain poorly understood, especially for elusive forest‐dependent species such as arboreal mammals. Using structural equation models, we assessed the direct and indirect effects of landscape forest loss on arboreal mammal assemblages in the Lacandona rainforest, Mexico. We placed camera traps in 100 canopy trees, and assessed the direct effect of forest cover and their indirect effects via changes in tree basal area and canopy openness on the abundance and diversity (i.e., species richness and exponential of Shannon entropy) of arboreal mammals. We found that forest loss had negative indirect effects on mammal richness through the increase of tree canopy openness. This could be related to the fact that canopy openness is usually inversely related to resource availability and canopy connectivity for arboreal mammals. Furthermore, independently of forest loss, the abundance and richness of arboreal mammals was positively related to tree basal area, which is typically higher in old‐growth forests. Thus, our findings suggest that arboreal mammals generally prefer old‐growth vegetation with relatively low canopy openness and high tree basal area. However, unexpectedly, forest loss was directly and positively related to the abundance and richness of mammals, probably due to a crowding effect, a reasonable possibility given the relatively short history (~40 years) of deforestation in the study region. Conversely, the Shannon diversity was not affected by the predictors we evaluated, suggesting that rare mammals (not the common species) are the ones most affected by these changes. All in all, our findings emphasize that conservation measures ought to focus on increasing forest cover in the landscape, and preventing the loss of large trees in the remaining forest patches.

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Physiological and immunological responses of birds and mammals to forest degradation: A meta-analysis

Cited by 28 publications

References 78 publications

Macroimmunology: The drivers and consequences of spatial patterns in wildlife immune defence

Macroimmunology: The drivers and consequences of spatial patterns in wildlife immune defence

Not all urban landscapes are the same: interactions between urban land use and stress in a large herbivorous mammal

Tropical forest loss impoverishes arboreal mammal assemblages by increasing tree canopy openness

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