Ongoing forest disturbance in Guatemala's protected areas

Knowledge of the conservation status of Bornean bats is biased towards areas considered to support high diversity in the northern Malaysian states. Few surveys have been undertaken in Indonesian Borneo, despite it representing over two thirds of the island's land area. We present the first description of a bat assemblage in Borneo's nutrient poor, or oligotrophic, forests (heath and peat swamp), habitats that have been considered depauperate in wildlife. We surveyed two protected areas in Central Kalimantan using harp traps supplemented by mist nets. We recorded 27 species, 18 of which were captured exclusively by harp traps. The bat assemblage of both sites was dominated by vespertilionids of the subfamily Kerivoulinae. The most abundant species, Kerivoula intermedia, accounted for 45% of standardized captures in Tanjung Puting National Park. At this site 15 species were represented by <10 captures each. Hipposideros ridleyi, Kerivoula lenis, Murina aenea and Murina rozendaali, four rare and threatened species, were recorded for the first time in Indonesia, and Phoniscus atrox, Murina cyclotis and Hipposideros doriae were recorded for the first time in Kalimantan. Estimation of species richness indicated that this inventory was almost complete for understorey, narrow-space, insectivores susceptible to capture in harp traps. It is likely that further surveys targeting open spaces, rivers, forest edges and the canopy will record species of other foraging guilds. The inventory exceeds those from other sites in Kalimantan because previous surveys have not used harp traps. However, it is a depauperate subset of assemblages studied in north Borneo, most likely because these sites are better known and are nearer to caves. Despite this relatively low diversity, our study shows that protected areas in oligotrophic forests provide valuable habitat for some of this island's rarest bat species, and are likely to become more important for bat conservation in light of widespread forest disturbance in Borneo.

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Degradation of visible autumn icons and conservation opportunities: trends in deciduous forest loss in the contiguous US

10.1101/2021.03.29.437570 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Lindsay M Dreiss ◽

Jacob W Malcom

Keyword(s):

Protected Areas ◽

Forest Cover ◽

Deciduous Forest ◽

Forest Disturbance ◽

The United States ◽

Environmental Stability ◽

Forest Loss ◽

Conservation Action ◽

Worst Case ◽

Temperate Deciduous Forests

Temperate deciduous forests are one of the most visible biomes on Earth because of their autumn aesthetics and because they harbor some of the most heavily populated regions, including in the United States. Their location and their ability to attract leaf-peeping outsiders may provide greater opportunities for people to experience nature, which has been linked to greater conservation action. However, accelerating human modification of landscapes means continued forest loss and fragmentation. We use spatial overlay analyses to quantify recent (1984-2016) and predicted (2016-2050) forest disturbance in each U.S. ecoregion and the extent to which each ecoregion falls into protected areas. Almost all ecoregions saw a steady decline in deciduous forest cover between 1985 and 2016 with some of the top ecoregions for autumn aesthetics being underrepresented in the protected areas network and vulnerable to additional losses. Generally, ecoregions undergoing greater proportional losses have greater forest area and are less represented in the protected areas network. Under worst-case forecasting scenarios, losses are predicted to continue. However, environmentally focused scenarios suggest there is still opportunity to reverse deciduous forest loss in some ecoregions. The large difference in forest loss estimates in the predictions scenarios emphasizes the importance of human approaches to economic growth and sustainability in securing environmental stability. Increasing public exposure to temperate forests may help ensure conservation of more natural areas and preserve the quantity and quality of autumn forest viewing.

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Effects of human activities on monarch butterfly habitat in protected mountain forests, Mexico

The Forestry Chronicle ◽

10.5558/tfc79242-2 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 79 (2) ◽

pp. 242-246 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

M Isabel Ramírez ◽

Joaquín G Azcárate ◽

Laura Luna

Keyword(s):

Protected Areas ◽

Human Activities ◽

Forest Disturbance ◽

Monarch Butterfly ◽

Subsistence Farming ◽

Mountain Forests ◽

Recovery Processes ◽

Wood Extraction ◽

Disturbance And Recovery ◽

Butterfly Population

Since the monarch butterfly overwintering habitat was discovered in the mountainous fir forests in central Mexico three presidential decrees have been issued (1980, 1986, 2001) to protect it. But these forests are the source of livelihood for many local people, whose activities (wood extraction and clearance for subsistence farming) represent a major threat to the forests, and thus to the butterfly population. This study identifies important deforestation, disturbance, and recovery processes caused by human activities in the protected areas and their surroundings. Contrary to our expectations, the protected areas have been most negatively affected by human activities, whereas areas devoted to multiple uses have been more adequately preserved. Key words: monarch butterfly habitat, deforestation, forest disturbance, protected areas

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Old-Growth Forest Disturbance in the Ukrainian Carpathians

Forests ◽

10.3390/f11020151 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 11 (2) ◽

pp. 151 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Benedict D. Spracklen ◽

Dominick V. Spracklen

Keyword(s):

Image Analysis ◽

Protected Areas ◽

Protected Area ◽

Forest Disturbance ◽

Satellite Image ◽

Old Growth ◽

Old Growth Forest ◽

Western Ukraine ◽

Future Loss ◽

Satellite Image Analysis

Human activity has greatly reduced the area of old-growth forest in Europe, with some of the largest remaining fragments in the Carpathian Mountains of south-western Ukraine. We used satellite image analysis to calculate old-growth forest disturbance in this region from 2010 to 2019. Over this period, we identified 1335 ha of disturbance in old-growth forest, equivalent to 1.8% of old-growth forest in the region. During 2015 to 2019, the average annual disturbance rate was 0.34%, varying with altitude, distance to settlements and location within the region. Disturbance rates were 7–8 times lower in protected areas compared to outside of protected areas. Only one third of old-growth forest is currently within protected areas; expansion of the protected area system to include more old-growth forests would reduce future loss. A 2017 law that gave protection to all old-growth forest in Ukraine had no significant impact on disturbance rates in 2018, but in 2019 disturbance rates reduced to 0.19%. Our analysis is the first indication that this new legislation may be reducing loss of old-growth forest in Ukraine.

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Monitoring selective logging with Landsat satellite imagery reveals that protected forests in Western Siberia experience greater harvest than non-protected forests

Environmental Conservation ◽

10.1017/s0376892916000576 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 44 (2) ◽

pp. 191-199 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

ALEXANDER SHCHUR ◽

EUGENIA BRAGINA ◽

ANIKA SIEBER ◽

ANNA M. PIDGEON ◽

VOLKER C. RADELOFF

Keyword(s):

Protected Areas ◽

Satellite Imagery ◽

Western Siberia ◽

Forest Disturbance ◽

Timber Harvesting ◽

Selective Logging ◽

Local Economy ◽

Natural Forests ◽

Landsat Images ◽

Protected Forests

SUMMARYWhen timber harvesting is an important source of local income and forest resources are declining, even forests that are designated as protected areas may become vulnerable. Therefore, regular monitoring of forest disturbance is necessary to enforce the protection of forest ecosystems. However, mapping forest disturbance with satellite imagery can be complicated if the majority of the harvesting is selective logging and not clearcuts. Our goal was to map both selective logging and clearcuts within and outside of protected areas in Western Siberia, a region with a highly developed timber industry. Combining summer and winter imagery allowed us to accurately estimate not only clearcuts, but also selective logging. Winter Landsat images substantially improved our classification and resulted in a highly accurate forest disturbance map (97.5% overall accuracy and 86% user accuracy for the rarest class, clearcuts). Selective logging and stripcuts were the dominant disturbance types, accounting for 96.3% of all forest disturbances, versus 3.7% for clearcuts. The total annual forest disturbance rate (i.e. disturbance rate for clearcuts, stripcuts and selective logging together) was 0.53%, but total forest disturbance within protected areas was greater than in non-protected forest (0.66% versus 0.50%, respectively), and so was the annual rate of selective logging (i.e. without clearcuts, 0.37% versus 0.25%, respectively). Our results highlight that monitoring only clearcuts without assessing selective logging might result in significant underestimation of forest disturbance. Also, when timber harvesting is important for the local economy and when protected areas have valuable timber resources that have already been depleted elsewhere, then additional protection may be necessary in order to maintain natural forests within protected areas. We suggest that this is the situation in our study area in Western Siberia right now and is likely the situation in many other parts of the globe as well.

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Continuous Detection of Forest Loss in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia Using Sentinel-1 Data

Remote Sensing ◽

10.3390/rs13234877 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (23) ◽

pp. 4877

Author(s):

Stéphane Mermoz ◽

Alexandre Bouvet ◽

Thierry Koleck ◽

Marie Ballère ◽

Thuy Le Toan

Keyword(s):

Protected Areas ◽

Large Scale ◽

Forest Disturbance ◽

Forest Loss ◽

False Alarms ◽

Forest Disturbances ◽

Mapping Unit ◽

Minimum Mapping Unit ◽

Conservation Of Natural Resources ◽

Do So

In this study, we demonstrate the ability of a new operational system to detect forest loss at a large scale accurately and in a timely manner. We produced forest loss maps every week over Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos (>750,000 km2 in total) using Sentinel-1 data. To do so, we used the forest loss detection method based on shadow detection. The main advantage of this method is the ability to avoid false alarms, which is relevant in Southeast Asia where the areas of forest disturbance may be very small and scattered and detection is used for alert purposes. The estimated user accuracy of the forest loss map was 0.95 for forest disturbances and 0.99 for intact forest, and the estimated producer’s accuracy was 0.90 for forest disturbances and 0.99 for intact forest, with a minimum mapping unit of 0.1 ha. This represents an important step forward compared to the values achieved by previous studies. We also found that approximately half of forest disturbances in Cambodia from 2018 to 2020 occurred in protected areas, which emphasizes the lack of efficiency in the protection and conservation of natural resources in protected areas. On an annual basis, the forest loss areas detected using our method are found to be similar to the estimations from Global Forest Watch. These results highlight the fact that this method provides not only quick alerts but also reliable detections that can be used to calculate weekly, monthly, or annual forest loss statistics at a national scale.

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The effect of protected areas on forest disturbance in the Carpathian Mountains 1985-2010

Conservation Biology ◽

10.1111/cobi.12835 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 31 (3) ◽

pp. 570-580 ◽

Cited By ~ 17

Author(s):

Van Butsic ◽

Catalina Munteanu ◽

Patrick Griffiths ◽

Jan Knorn ◽

Volker C. Radeloff ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Protected Areas ◽

Forest Disturbance ◽

Carpathian Mountains

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Biodiversity and Human Livelihoods in Protected Areas

10.1017/cbo9780511542169 ◽

2007 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Keyword(s):

Protected Areas

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Crossing Divides: Conducting Mixed Methods Research in Protected Areas

The Indian Journal of Social Work ◽

10.32444/ijsw.2018.79.3.291-308 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 79 (3) ◽

pp. 291

Author(s):

BIJAYASHREE SATPATHY

Keyword(s):

Mixed Methods ◽

Protected Areas ◽

Mixed Methods Research

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ESTIMATION OF ABOVE GROUND BIOMASS OF THE THREE SITES (GRAZED SITE, PROTECTED SITE AND SEED SOWN SITE) FOR COMPARING THEIR PRODUCTIVITY IN KASHMIR VALLEY

FLORA AND FAUNA ◽

10.33451/florafauna.v23i2pp259-262 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 23 (2) ◽

Author(s):

AFSHAN ANJUM BABA ◽

SYED NASEEM UL-ZAFAR GEELANI ◽

ISHRAT SALEEM ◽

MOHIT HUSAIN ◽

PERVEZ AHMAD KHAN ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Protected Areas ◽

Aboveground Biomass ◽

Plant Biomass ◽

Summer Season ◽

Above Ground Biomass ◽

Spring Season ◽

Kashmir Valley ◽

Ground Biomass ◽

Maximum Value ◽

Protected Site

The plant biomass for protected areas was maximum in summer (1221.56 g/m2) and minimum in winter (290.62 g/m2) as against grazed areas having maximum value 590.81 g/m2 in autumn and minimum 183.75 g/m2 in winter. Study revealed that at Protected site (Kanidajan) the above ground biomass ranged was from a minimum (1.11 t ha-1) in the spring season to a maximum (4.58 t ha-1) in the summer season while at Grazed site (Yousmarag), the aboveground biomass varied from a minimum (0.54 t ha-1) in the spring season to a maximum of 1.48 t ha-1 in summer seasonandat Seed sown site (Badipora), the lowest value of aboveground biomass obtained was 4.46 t ha-1 in spring while as the highest (7.98 t ha-1) was obtained in summer.

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