3 research outputs found
Effect of Landscape Composition and Invasive Plants on Pollination Networks of Smallholder Orchards in Northeastern Thailand
No full textDestruction of natural habitat, land-use changes and biological invasion are some of the major threats to biodiversity. Both habitat alteration and biological invasions can have impacts on pollinator communities and pollination network structures. This study aims to examine the effect of an invasive plant, praxelis (Praxelis clematidea; Asteraceae), and land-use types on pollinator communities and the structure of pollination networks. We conducted the study in smallholder orchards which are either invaded or non-invaded by P. clematidea. We estimated the pollinator richness, visitation rates, and pollinator diversity and evaluated the network structures from 18 smallholder orchards in Northeastern Thailand. The effect of landscape structure in the vicinity of the orchards was investigated, with the proportion of agricultural, forest, and urban landscape within a 3 km radius analyzed. The invasive species and land-use disturbance influence the pollinator communities and pollination network structure at species level was affected by the presence of P. clematidea. Bees were the most important pollinator group for pollinator communities and pollination networks of both invaded or non-invaded plots, as bees are a generalist species, they provide the coherence of both the network and its own module. The urban landscape had a strong negative influence on pollinator richness, while the proportions of agriculture and forest landscape positively affected the pollinator community
Landscape-level effects on pollination networks and fruit-set of crops in tropical small-holder agroecosystems
No full textThere is a global concern of pollinator declines and linked ecosystem service losses. However, although land-use changes are a primary threat to biodiversity, how land-use change affects pollinator communities, pollination networks and fruit-set of food crops is poorly understood. The impact of land-use changes is especially understudied in tropical systems, even though most tropical crops are highly dependent on animal pollination. Using 40 sites to investigate diurnal and nocturnal flower visitors in small-scale agroecosystems across land-use gradients in Thailand and tropical South-western China, we show that habitat structure shapes pollinator communities at local (floral species richness) and landscape level (percentage of tree plantation in a 500 m radius and percentage forest in a 5 km radius), influencing both the species richness of pollinators and their visitation rates. These, in turn, alter plant-pollinator network structure: community-level specialization increases with floral species richness and percentage of forest cover. However, the specialization decreases with percentage of tree plantation, illustrating that natural habitat better supports specialized species. Furthermore, fruit-sets of several crops were affected by land-use. Notably, fruit-set of mango was positively associated with the percentage of forest cover in the surrounding landscape. These findings reveal how land-use influence pollinator communities and highlight how natural habitats may safeguard ecosystem services.</p
Who is publishing in ecology and evolution? the underrepresentation of women and the Global South
No full textIntroduction: Most global biodiversity is in developing economies. Decades of capacity building should have built sufficient in-country capacity to develop biodiversity baselines; yet has effort provided the expertise to build these baselines?Methods: Grants and access to research opportunities are often linked to success in publishing, with the H-index providing the main metric of academic success. Recent compilations of “Top Researchers in Ecology and Evolution” included 5,419 researchers, but where these researchers are and how representative they are has not been well studied. We explored the global distribution of “Top Researchers in Ecology and Evolution” and explored the representation of Women, non-Caucasians, and non-Caucasian women, as well as the representation of “local” top researchers in different regions.Results: Over half Top Researchers in Ecology and Evolution are from just three countries (United States, United Kingdom, and Australia), and 83% come from 12 higher-income countries. Even in lower-income economies the majority of the few “high impact” researchers are originally from higher-income economies. Only China had a high proportion of their high-impact non-Caucasian researchers, with the majority of researchers coming from that region. Women were also underrepresented across the globe, only three countries had more than 20% of top-performing ecologists being female.Discussion: Ultimately, despite decades of capacity building, we are still failing to build in-country capacity for research or to provide sufficient support for female ecologists to publish and lead the field. Here we discuss why these issues persist, and how we might improve representation and access to opportunity and support for all groups, and provide the analysis needed to provide solutions to global challenges in biodiversity conservation, which require diverse representation to develop effective, and nuanced solutions
