New publication on vulture and mortality hotspots

Curk, T., [...] Santangeli, A., 2024 Integrating threat mapping and animal movement data to identify high-risk areas for endangered mobile species. https://doi.org/10.1111/acv.12980

In a shell: The work maps poisoning risks for the Lappet-faced Vultures in Southern Africa. It helps to identify hotspots that require conservation efforts. High food availability in these areas increases vulture risks of mortality.

Abstract:  Given the current biodiversity crisis, understanding how animals move across a landscape dotted with different anthropogenic threats and the consequences of those threats for animals is paramount to devising evidence-based conservation interventions. Vultures roam across large areas and are highly exposed to poisoning, which represents a particularly damaging form of wildlife crime. In this study, we introduce a framework for quantifying the exposure to threats and illustrate an example of poisoning risk as a threat in an endangered African vulture species, the Lappet-faced Vulture (Torgos tracheliotos). 

photo from ebird

We combined GPS tracking data of 19 individuals collected between 2012 and 2022 with food availability and spatial threat maps of both intentional (poachers directly targeting vultures) and unintentional (farmers aiming to kill carnivores, with vultures being secondarily affected) poisoning across most of Southern Africa. We identified poisoning hotspots in northern Botswana and south-eastern Namibia. These areas were also associated with a high number of vulture mortalities, providing additional support for poisoning risk. Northern Botswana and areas at the border between Botswana and South Africa were characterized by high food availability, potentially amplifying the mortality rate by attracting vultures from surrounding areas. Our results offer valuable insights for regional vulture conservation, together with a methodological framework for quantifying and mapping the spatial exposure to threats for mobile species of conservation concern, enabling improved targeting of conservation actions.

 

New Publication on mortality of migratory birds!

Serratosa, J., Oppel, S., Rotichs, S, Santangeli, A., [...] , Jones, V. R. 2024 Tracking data highlight the importance of human-induced mortality for large migratory birds at a flyway scale. Biological Conservation 293, 110525

In a shell: Despite stable frequencies of human-induced mortality over the past 15 years in the African-Eurasian flyway, conservation efforts targeting energy infrastructure and other human activities are necessary to mitigate these threats and safeguard bird species.

Abstract: Human-induced direct mortality affects huge numbers of birds each year, threatening hundreds of species worldwide. Tracking technologies can be an important tool to investigate temporal and spatial patterns of bird mortality as well as their drivers. We compiled 1704 mortality records from tracking studies across the African-Eurasian flyway for 45 species, including raptors, storks, and cranes, covering the period from 2003 to 2021. Our results show a higher frequency of human-induced causes of mortality than natural causes across taxonomic groups, geographical areas, and age classes. Moreover, we found that the frequency of human-induced mortality remained stable over the study period. From the human-induced mortality events with a known cause (n = 637), three main causes were identified: electrocution (40.5 %), illegal killing (21.7 %), and poisoning (16.3 %). 

Additionally, combined energy infrastructure-related mortality (i.e., electrocution, power line collision, and wind-farm collision) represented 49 % of all human-induced mortality events. Using a random forest model, the main predictors of human-induced mortality were found to be taxonomic group, geographic location (latitude and longitude), and human footprint index value at the location of mortality. Despite conservation efforts, human drivers of bird mortality in the African-Eurasian flyway do not appear to have declined over the last 15 years for the studied group of species. Results suggest that stronger conservation actions to address these threats across the flyway can reduce their impacts on species. In particular, projected future development of energy infrastructure is a representative example where application of planning, operation, and mitigation measures can enhance bird conservation.