FW 403 (001) Fall 2024 Urban Wildlife Management

The research article that I have chosen to review investigates the impacts of solar energy development on urban wildlife species in the southwestern United States. Renewable energy developers are looking to turn public land into utility-scale solar farms that traditionally occupy at least one thousand acres of land. The Southwest United States is considered a hotspot for biodiversity and endangered species, which creates an interesting conflict between renewable energy development and impacts on wildlife. This region is attractive to developers because there is a lot of available dry land, and it is the area with the highest solar irradiance in the country.

This research article delves into the known and potential impacts that utility-scale solar has on wildlife, including habitat destruction and modification, wildlife mortality, dust and dust-suppression effects, off-site impacts, noise pollution, light pollution, fire effects, water consumption, and microclimate effects. I believe that the article does a thorough job at considering the environmental impacts of solar on urban wildlife in the area. Additionally, the article considers the construction and decommissioning of the solar farms and how these processes impact the surrounding wildlife. The results state that all energy production has social and environmental costs, which is why it is important to weigh the pros and cons of developing in a given area.

In order to advance this study, I believe that community impacts should be studied. Urban wildlife and green spaces hold a huge role in recreational activities for certain areas. This study fails to consider how solar plants could impact populations of wildlife that communities rely on. For example, if a solar plant has negative impacts on fish or deer, this could impact hunting in the area. Also, I believe that further research indicating specific species should be completed. Although the article discusses Aggasiz’s desert tortoise, I believe that the results would be more impactful if more species were selected and studied.

Overall, I chose this article because I am interested in sustainable energy development, and I believe that any and all types of development can impact wildlife. With developers wanting to be near cities and load centers, there will be an increase in interactions between these urban wildlife species that live near future energy centers. Developers must consider how their industrial development will impact species, and how to best mitigate these negative impacts.

Source: Lovich, J. E., & Ennen, J. R. (2011). Wildlife Conservation and Solar Energy Development in the Desert Southwest, United States. BioScience, 61(12), 982–992. https://doi.org/10.1525/bio.2011.61.12.8

Urban metabolism can be defined as the sum of the technical and socio-economic processes that occur in cities, resulting in growth, production of energy, and elimination of waste. This classification of urban environments encompasses quantifying outputs, inputs and storage of energy, nutrients, water, materials and wastes for an urban region. Although this article was written years ago, quantifying data varies temporally. I wanted to express my confusion about why the research varies. It was expressed that studies were made in the 1970s and interest dropped off in the 1980s. No further information was provided on the matter, so as the reader I am left with the question of why this happened. I am sure a further study could be conducted; my immediate thoughts were political conflicts or lack of funding as more research broke out in the 1990s.

When defining the urban metabolism factoring scale is of major concern. When factoring in such a matter, the author describes the review of two separate methodical approaches to the idea of urban metabolism. The two approaches being energy equivalence and the flow of resources. In particular, solar energy was the universal metric in the study as recognition of the variation in the quality of different forms of energy were made, while the mainstream of study being the flow of resources because it was more readily accessible and easily understandable when communicating with local government officials.

Research references across the globe were provided about urban metabolism. Some places including Hong Kong, London, Toronto, Phoenix, UK, Lisbon, Ireland, and BangKok. The author primarily focuses on a single application for urban metabolism, although still provides research on every application in which it was used. I felt that was an important thing to note as most articles would cut out the unnecessary information, but the reader can get ideas on other applications in this article. The author reviews the application in terms of all things encompassing sustainability. The terms include urban greenhouse gas accounting, urban design, sustainability reporting, and mathematical modeling for policy analysis. These are just the practical applications for urban planners.

There are four major urban activities: to reside and work, to clean, to transport and communicate, and to nourish and recover. There are four major components to urban metabolism: energy, food, water, and construction materials. These features can be taken into account when reconstructing cities. An example of this would be New Orleans after hurricane Katrina. This framework of thinking is being implemented within the industrial ecology community, which now focuses on urban and social metabolism. The author provides a list of several advantages of the application of urban metabolism framework. Some which include, accounts for inputs and outputs to the system, integrates social science and biophysical science/technology, and necessitates analysis of policy and technology outcomes with respect to sustainability goals.

This paper did a wonderful job at reviewing research on urban metabolism as a whole. The author referenced over 50 papers in total all pertaining to research on urban metabolism in different years. The author also starts off in the first couple paragraphs providing the reader with questions to ponder while learning about urban metabolisms research history. The author leads out with the idea that further work needs to be done and explains that an important future direction that needs to take place is more implementation to economic, social, and health indicators into the framework of the research. I could not agree more with that statement. When understanding the research that has been done these factors were lacking when understanding the urban metabolism as a whole.

Kennedy, C., et al. “The Study of Urban Metabolism and Its Applications to Urban Planning and Design.” Environmental Pollution, vol. 167, no. 8-9, Aug. 2012, p. 184–185, doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2010.10.022.

Urban wildlife management is very tricky as people have many different levels of tolerance and attitudes towards wildlife. This paper addresses the complications with the idea of “the right place” to put an animal in relation to human society and the physical places it to which it “belongs.” To many people, pets belong in the city, livestock belong in the countryside, and wildlife belong in the wilderness. However, wildlife do not stick to strict boundaries, and many opportunistic generalists actually prefer city life. To gauge public opinion on wildlife placement in the city, this study asks residents of Munich, Germany where they want different species to occur.

To do this, researchers created flyers to describe the project and access to the online survey, and distributed it among houses and residential buildings. To me, this is one of the major limitations of the study. Doing surveys is always hard, as many of us have learned through statistics. I think it’s great that the survey is online and easily accessible; however, they distributed the flyers through handing them out on the street. I think this is a good way to get people’s immediate attention, but we all know how easy it is to ignore someone trying to give you something while you’re walking to class. Posted flyers could have been a way to mitigate this issue, so people could have voluntary interest. Multiple methods of outreach could also be beneficial. For example, people may be less likely to ignore a phone call or an email.

Survey participants were asked to share their demographics, relationship with nature, attitudes toward 32 different species, and where they wanted animals to occur. Demographics requested were age, gender, and highest finished education. I would be interested to see how socioeconomic status would affect opinions, but education level could possibly be used as a similar metric. The researchers chose generally recognizable species with a wide range of taxon. I think they chose a great group of animals, though I was surprised to see no large mammalian apex predators listed. Although this could be because they do not occur commonly in the city.

After analyzation, the data suggests that people more readily placed animals farther from their homes. I was surprised to see that rabbits were not wanted in the city. I think this table layout works very well and is easy to understand for readers.

This is how the researchers chose to display the opinions on where specific animals should be. This graph is quite hard to understand with unclear axes’. A different representation of the data would make it more understandable for readers.

The attitudes of people towards each animal also significantly impacted how far they were placed from the home. This table is very easy to understand with context from the article.

Since “nowhere” was rarely picked as a placement for these species, it shows that people do acknowledge that wildlife somewhat “belong” in the city. However, near the home was the least popular option for placement. With the abundance of yards and green space in residential areas, where does this leave the wildlife? If the wildlife are not to be allowed in the available greenspaces, then other areas in cities need to become available with resources and niche needs to divert wildlife away from the home. Overall, I think this was a very interesting study with a lot of insights into the effect of public opinion on urban wildlife management. These findings will be very beneficial for future urban planning, and the planning of outreach and public education initiatives about urban ecology.

Fabio S T Sweet, Anne Mimet, Md Noor Ullah Shumon, Leonie P Schirra, Julia Schäffler, Sophia C Haubitz, Peter Noack, Thomas E Hauck, Wolfgang W Weisser, There is a place for every animal, but not in my back yard: a survey on attitudes towards urban animals and where people want them to live, Journal of Urban Ecology, Volume 10, Issue 1, 2024, juae006, https://doi.org/10.1093/jue/juae006

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0003347223001689?ref=cra_js_challenge&fr=RR-1

Urbanization is the most rapid form of landscape transformation the world has ever seen. This expansion of urban areas forces wildlife to adjust their behavior in order to survive. One species that has had great success living around urban areas is the red fox (Vulpes vulpes). Recent viewpoints on these widespread carnivores may paint them as pests due to their opportunistic foraging habits. However, it is unknown whether urban adjusted foxes are in fact that much bolder and smarter than their rural counterparts, when foraging for food. This study aimed to answer this question and give better context for how we perceive urban red foxes.

This study was conducted across 200 locations in England and Scotland. Across these locations, food-related objects were deployed for fox interaction. There were 8 unique styles of objects that required problem-solving to access the food. Trail cameras were used to monitor fox behavior around the objects. A principal component analysis of urban and rural landscape variables was used to analyze the data. The researchers found that “urbanization was significantly and positively related to the likelihood of foxes touching, but not exploiting, the objects”. They concluded because of this that urban foxes are bolder, but not more innovative than their rural counterparts.

One thing I think this paper does really well is the methodological descriptions of the experiment. It is very clear on the variables and behaviors that count as acknowledgement and exploitation. It is also very strong in accounting for its own limitations. For example, six months after the initial testing, researchers revisited 30 sites and placed three different food samples without an object to act as a control for potential food preference. The methods are very thorough and numerous variables are taken into account. One variable the paper mentions they left out but I think would be very useful is the individuality of each fox. I think if individual foxes were differentiated it would have been very interesting to see if some foxes were more innovative than others. This would also make up for a potential data skew due to individuals displaying innovative behavior at multiple locations. 

The results section is also explained well but I do not agree with the outline of information. It starts with the results of the secondary food test and I think this would be better towards the end of the section after the broader results were discussed. The statistical analyses and principal component analysis sections are split by findings of the different variables. I think the flow would be maintained if these two sections followed one another because they discuss similar aspects of the study. 

The discussion is very thorough and organized in a fluid way. I really like the section citing similar studies that yielded varying results, it does a nice job of specifying just how nuanced and complex urban wildlife behavior is across species. It solidifies its point that foxes are likely not the “pests” they are sometimes viewed to be by people. Further research should follow individual foxes of varying characteristics such as age, size, sex, etc. This will allow researchers to better differentiate urban from rural foxes and to observe individual innovation.

Morton F.B, Gartner M, Norrie E, Haddou Y, Soulsbury C.D, Adaway K.A. 2023. Urban foxes are bolder but not more innovative than their rural conspecifics. Animal Behaviour 203:101–113.

This article addresses the increasing concerns, incidents, and potential issues stemming from negative human-wildlife interactions. The article does a good job of addressing the effects that management can have on populations rather than allowing them to persist uncontacted and without interference. Acknowledging that fragmentation can occur because of human management is an important part of what the article talks about, as well as that certain management practices promote plastic vs genetic change and why either would be aimed for as a goal.

The authors’ findings show that behavioral shifts in animals are directly correlated to how human/animal interactions tend to play out in urban environments vs non-urban environments. Often, new behaviors and plastic changes are passed down through generations in urban environments because human interactions tend not to be lethal, whereas genetic changes are often passed down in non-urban environments so that populations can survive. In urban environments, nocturnality, problem-solving, increased tolerance, diet niche shifts, and fear responses are all behaviors that urban wildlife species show to have developed through time. 

Soci-economic factors have been shown to impact human attitudes and interactions regarding wildlife. Low-income communities tend not to have access to substantial green spaces, vegetation, and other environmental problems. Increased negative interactions occur more frequently because of the limited space available and can cause many issues like property damage and even increased health risks. Because of the compounded factors, lower-middle to lower class income families and communities tend to have a much more negative attitude towards urban wildlife and are far more likely to have negative interactions.

Management practice has a significant impact on the current and future generations of urban wildlife, as the type of control used on populations influences the behaviors and perceptions of the animals. For example, mass rodenticides are one of the few practices that wipe out entire populations and are for the benefit of both humans and wildlife. By keeping these otherwise exponentially growing populations at bay, negative attitudes towards urban wildlife more broadly can be positively influenced and perceived. Single target removals and translocations are other methods of protecting wildlife and humans, specifically for larger animals. Oftentimes, wildlife will changes their behaviors and/or traits as to not draw attention to themselves and avoid having to have these interactions with wildlife management.

Overall, this article effectively highlights causation and impacts on wildlife in urban settings and how attitudes towards wildlife can be impacted. I think that certain methods could have been further explored and in more detail but I believe that it is an effective and productive article regardless.

The purpose of this study was to educate the public about the negative effects of feeding birds. It is common for people to see birds and want to feed them, although, they do not realize the detrimental effects it has on the birds. Birds are scavengers and if people start feeding them, they become reliant on humans instead of their instincts. This can lead to severe injury and death. 

This study was conducted in Massachusetts over a two year time span, from 2011 to 2013. The focus of this study was to monitor people who feed seagulls and gather data. There were eight parking lots surveyed and divided into two categories, educational lots and no educational lots. Educational lots informed people of the dangers of feeding birds and asked them to stop feeding them while non educational lots did not put signs out, nor did they ask the public to stop feeding the birds. Researchers spent about 1200 hours total in these parking lots during the study. 

The target species of seagulls was ring- billed gulls or Lorus delawarensis. These seagulls are one of the most common and account for 98 percent of the seagull population. The results showed there were less humans feeding bids in educational lots by about .01 in one monitoring session. The results also showed, that in two monitoring sessions, the amount of seagulls frequenting the educational lot had increased by about .08. This led to the non educational lots being transformed into educational lots. Even after this change, there was no significant difference in the amount of birds seen. There was a decent decrease in the feedings by about .055.

This study showed that humans feeding birds is one of the most common wildlife interactions, about 95% of people feed birds. Unfortunately, because it has been going on for so long, feeding wild birds is not going to stop. The only way to create a safer environment is to educate humans on the effects. This study did a good job of bringing awareness and educating the public about the dangers of feeding wild birds. 

Clark, D. E., Whitney, J. J., MacKenzie, K. G., Koenen, K. K. G., & DeStefano, S. (2015). Assessing gull abundance and food availability in urban parking lots. Human – Wildlife Interactions, 9(2), 180-190. https://proxying.lib.ncsu.edu/index.php?url=https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/assessing-gull-abundance-food-availability-urban/docview/1733928388/se-2

Insects, being one of the most diversified and important ecological groups on the planet, are at risk of declining populations due to climate change. This paper focused on how using data from long-term monitoring of insect populations could give insight and answer more recent questions regarding population dynamics and climate change. The authors pooled together various studies that had at least a 10 year continuous sampling time frame, looked at 10 or more species, was restricted to a “protected area/ gradient of land use,” and analyzed climate change as a possible causative factor.

A case study highlighting butterflies residing in an “undisturbed” mountainous portion of northern California was used to explore any relationship between geographical differences and climate change. It was found that montane insects had easy access to a range of elevation gradients and therefore could adapt to changing climate by moving to more optimal thermal environments in order to efficiently thermoregulate. Since insects are poikilotherms, they must rely on the environment to regulate their body temperature, unlike those that have an internal temperature regulation. Having microclimates closer in proximity to one another without fragmentation by human development meant the insects could easily disperse amongst the patches of optimal habitat in order to fulfill their thermal needs.

An aspect of this analysis that differentiates it from papers that simply want to confirm whether or not climate change is directly influencing insect population dynamics is comparing climate change to other stressors like land use. From a management perspective, this would allow resources and time to be effectively allocated to mitigate whichever stressor is likely to have the greatest impact. Although this is a logical way of attempting to maximize the potential to conserve a population and its ecological niche, the stressors are not always so clear-cut and many times are entwined or even interdependent on one another. Stressors that might have been initiated by climate change have been shaped or accelerated by anthropogenic influence.

The selection of studies chosen to be analyzed through the aforementioned criteria also include an inherent geographical and taxa bias, since the majority of long-term continuous insect observations have been based in northern Europe and looked at the order Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths). The gap in long-term studies has hindered understanding of climate change over a diverse range of biomes, especially those found in tropical areas where there is an insect biodiversity hotspot. Conclusions being drawn from collective studies mostly pertaining to Lepidopterans cannot be applied to the full class of Insecta, as the dispersal rate to new microclimates for butterflies is a feat that may not be as easily accomplished by Coleopterans (beetles) for example.

This article is important because insects can be keystone species or even ecosystem engineers and without them a vital portion of the food web would be missing. In order to effectively mitigate stressors for insect populations, there must be more inclusive long-term studies that give insight on a more diverse spectrum of insect orders and geographical range. Additionally, this spreads awareness to the importance of a continuous landscape with a gradient of microclimates for insects to disperse to suitable thermal environments in response to climate change.