227 research outputs found
100 articles every ecologist should read
No full textReading scientific articles is a valuable and major part of the activity of scientists. Yet, with the upsurge of currently available articles and the increasing specialization of scientists, it becomes difficult to identify, let alone read, important papers covering topics not directly related to one's own specific field of research, or that are older than a few years. Our objective was to propose a list of seminal papers deemed to be of major importance in ecology, thus providing a general 'must-read' list for any new ecologist, regardless of particular topic or expertise. We generated a list of 544 papers proposed by 147 ecology experts (journal editorial members) and subsequently ranked via random-sample voting by 368 of 665 contacted ecology experts, covering 6 article types, 6 approaches and 17 fields. Most of the recommended papers were not published in the highest-ranking journals, nor did they have the highest number of mean annual citations. The articles proposed through the collective recommendation of several hundred experienced researchers probably do not represent an 'ultimate', invariant list, but they certainly contain many high-quality articles that are undoubtedly worth reading-regardless of the specific field of interest in ecology-to foster the understanding, knowledge and inspiration of early-career scientists.Franck Courchamp and Corey J. A. Bradsha
Less is more: rarity trumps quality in luxury markets
No full textThe international market for luxury goods has almost doubled since 1990, with a worldwide increase of 10% annually. This trade is fuelled by a great deal of legally and illegally exploited wildlife species, putting enormous pressure on many of them, with potentially irreversible consequences. The dramatic decline of sturgeon populations exploited for their caviar, is a good example: all 27 species are threatened and the most coveted are on the verge of extinction. We aim to identify the mechanism responsible for the continued overexploitation of sturgeon species, despite caviar's ever-increasing price and the imminent loss of these species. Here, we demonstrate consumer preference for rarity over intrinsic quality: customers tasting two caviar samples more often chose the one they thought was rare, although both were identical. In a game theory model, we demonstrate that the most rational behaviour is to rush to consume rare species, even though this precipitates their extinction. We conclude that the human predisposition to place exaggerated value on rarity probably drives the entire market for luxury goods from reptile skins to exotic woods. Our findings suggest that allowing low levels of legal trade will exacerbate the arbitrary value of rare species and thereby stimulate demand. Only a total ban on trade from the wild (with very strict controls) combined with strong support for farmed equivalents will protect rare species
Behavioral data and analyses of competitive interactions between invasive and native ant species [from Cordonnier et al. 2021, Animals]
No full textThis README accompanies the files "data_Cordonnier_Animals.txt" & "script_Cordonnier_Animals.txt"
Associated publication :
The native ant Lasius niger can limit the access to resources of the invasive Argentine ant
M. Cordonnier, O. Blight, E. Angulo, and F. Courchamp
Published in Animals
********************************** CONTENTS *****************************
The data are in table form with TABs as variables field delimiters so they can be readily imported in any statistical package or spreadsheet program. Please, contact me if you need the file formatted otherwise.
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Variable names and descriptions
Status_Lh status of Linepithema humile (Colonizer or Resident)
opp species of the opponent
combirc combination of status and species interacting
temp temperature during the test
hygro hygrometry during the test
categ interacting species combination
n_deadtot_opp total number of dead opponent workers
t_50dead_opp time when 50% of the opponent mortality load have been diagnosed
t_interact time of the first interaction between L. humile and opponent workers
t_maxfights time when the maximal number of simultaneous fights occurs
ET_fights standard deviation of the numbers of fights over time
mean_fights mean number of simultaneous fights during the contest
n_deadtot_Lh total number of dead workers of L. humile
t_50dead_Lh time when 50% of the L. humile mortality load have been diagnosed
t_arena_opp time of the opponent entrance in the arena
t_bait_opp time of opponent resources’ discovery
t_maxarena_opp time when the max. number of opponent workers occurs in the arena
mean_arena_opp mean number of opponent workers simultaneously present in the whole arena
t_maxbait_opp time when the maximal number of opponent workers on the bait occurs
mean_bait_opp mean number of opponent workers on the bait
t_arena_Lh time of the entrance in the arena of L. humile
t_maxarena_Lh time when the max. number of workers of L. humile occurs in the arena
mean_arena_Lh mean number of L. humile workers simultaneously present in the whole arena
n_totprey_Lh total number of preys brought by L. humile
t_bait_Lh time of resources’ discovery by L. humile
t_maxbait_Lh time when the maximal number of L. humile individuals on the bait occurs
ETbait_Lh standard deviation of the numbers of L. humile workers on the bait over time
mean_bait_Lh mean number of L. humile workers on the bait
t_50prey_Lh time when 50% of the final prey load
******************************** CONTACT *********************************
Please contact me at:
Marion Cordonnier
e-mail: [email protected]
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Real-time anti-poaching tags could help prevent imminent species extinctions
No full textThis research was funder by Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council - Grant Number: BB/G023913/2.At an estimated $7–10 billion annually, the global trade in illegal wildlife parts is comparable in economic value to human trafficking, and the smuggling of weapons and drugs (Wasser et al. 2008; Wyler & Sheikh 2013). Basic economic principles of supply and demand ensure that, as target species become ever rarer, their market value continues to rise, gradually pushing them towards extinction (Courchamp et al. 2006; Nowell 2012a). One particular problem is that anti-poaching rangers often arrive too late at crime scenes to arrest criminals, making poaching a low-risk and high-gains enterprise (Wyler & Sheikh 2013). Here, we identify an opportunity to address this fundamental problem – we propose that cutting-edge tracking technology could be harnessed to implement effective ‘real-time poaching-alert systems’. Animals would be fitted with miniature electronic devices (‘biologgers’) that can detect a poaching event, establish its exact location, and relay data remotely to ground teams. Such systems should considerably increase the chances of successful interception, and thereby, escalate the actual and perceived risks of poaching, establishing a powerful new deterrent. In combination with other mitigation strategies (reviewed below), this innovative approach could lead to a much-needed breakthrough in the increasingly desperate fight against wildlife crime.Peer reviewe
Marketing products with wildlife : how to make it benefit conservation
No full textCITATION: Braczkowski, A. et al. 2021. Marketing products with wildlife : how to make it benefit conservation. Frontiers in Conservation Science, 2:649686, doi:10.3389/fcosc.2021.649686.The original publication is available at https://www.frontiersin.orgA key obstacle to wildlife conservation is a scarcity of funding. A recent paper
[Courchamp, F., Jaric, I., Albert, C., Meinard, Y., Ripple, W. J., and Chapron, G. (2018).
The paradoxical extinction of the most charismatic animals. PLoS Biol. 16:e2003997.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.2003997] illustrates how for-profit businesses’ widespread
use of threatened wildlife imagery could create complacency in the public about their
conservation. A wildlife imagery royalty, whereby businesses that use threatened wildlife
in their marketing pay a small percentage of their sales to the conservation of those
species could be revolutionary for conservation funding. However, businesses are not
currently compelled to support the protection of the species espoused in their products.
We build upon the arguments presented by recent publications [Good, C., Burnham,
D., and Macdonald, D. W. (2017). A cultural conscience for conservation. Animals 7:52.
doi: 10.3390/ani7070052; Courchamp, F., Jaric, I., Albert, C., Meinard, Y., Ripple, W.
J., and Chapron, G. (2018). The paradoxical extinction of the most charismatic animals.
PLoS Biol. 16:e2003997. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.2003997] to explore limitations and
a number of key pathways that may help bring a wildlife imagery royalty to fruition.Publisher's versio
Make open access publishing fair and transparent!
No full textThe scientific publication landscape has dramatically changed in environmental sciences (and beyond) since the onset of this millennium by two closely interconnected trends: the widespread emergence of online-only journals that drastically reduced the costs for scientific publishers (Van Noorden 2013) and the increasing success of open access (OA) publishing journals (Tennant et al. 2016)—that is, journals that have reversed the revenue generation from a reader-pays to an author-pays approach. In principle, there are four avenues of OA publishing (table 1): An increasing number of journals have been established that solely publish OA (gold OA); the vast majority of these journals are online only
Supplementary material 1 from: Diagne C, Catford JA, Essl F, Nuñez MA, Courchamp F (2020) What are the economic costs of biological invasions? A complex topic requiring international and interdisciplinary expertise. NeoBiota 63: 25-37. https://doi.org/10.3897/neobiota.63.55260
No full textList of participants and associated informatio
Time series and life history data for 1198 species
No full textOur dataset, originally compiled by BW Brook, CJA Bradshaw and others (see Brook, BW, Bradshaw, CJA, &
Traill, LW [2006] Ecology Letters, 9, 375-382) and updated by Gregory SD (see Gregory, SD, Bradshaw, CJA,
Brook, BW, & Courchamp, F [in press] Ecology; as at November 2009) is a compilation of population time series for 1198 species together with geographical and temporal metadata, and species life history information. All major taxonomic groups from plants to mammals are represented. Gregory et al. also used the Climate Research Unit's High Resolution Gridded Time Series datasets (CRU TS 2.1 available at http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/hrg.htm)
Gender bias when assessing recommended ecology articles
No full textGender bias is still unfortunately rife in the sciences, and men co-author most articles (> 70%) in ecology. Whether ecologists subconsciously rate the quality of their peers' work more favourably when they are the same gender (homophily) is still unclear. To test this hypothesis, we examined how ecologist editors ranked important ecology articles based on a previously compiled list where they had first each proposed some articles and then voted on all proposed articles. The proportion of female co-authors on the articles proposed by men were lower (0.06 to 0.09) than those proposed by women (0.13 to 0.27), although the data were highly skewed and most proposed articles (77%) had no female co-authors. For the 100 top-ranked articles voted by women or men only, the gender difference remained: female voters ranked articles in the top 100 that had more female co-authors (0.029 to 0.093 proportion women) than did those voted by men (0.001 to 0.029). Female voters tended to rank articles more highly as the number of male co-authors increased, and the relationship between article rank and proportion of male co-authors was even stronger when only men voted. This effect disappeared after testing only articles that editors declared they had actually read. This could indicate a persistent, subconscious tendency toward homophily when assessing the perceived quality of articles that ecologists have not actually read
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