Effects of roads on small-mammal movements: Opportunities and risks of vegetation management on roadsides.

Roads can block animal movement and reduce persistence of species living in road surroundings. Movement restrictions on local populations may even increase extinction risk of abundant small mammals. However, road verges (road managed area between the edge of the road and the beginning of private land) may provide refuge and corridors for small mammals when properly managed. Information on the effects of roads and roadside management on small-mammal movement is still scarce for low traffic roads (<20,000 vehicles per day) crossing well-preserved habitats. We aimed to fill this gap by comparing fine-scale movement patterns of wood mice (Apodemus sylvaticus) in a road and in a similar roadless area without management. Both areas consisted of a well-preserved Mediterranean agro-silvo pastoral system. We studied several movement patterns: road crossings, verge use, length, and direction of movement. Additionally, we assessed how roadside management, animals' sex and residency status, season and microhabitat affect movement at the road area. At the roadless area, we defined a virtual road and verges at equivalent locations to the road area for comparison purposes. We gathered capture-mark-recapture data for two years to characterize movement patterns. Wood mice tended to avoid the road by crossing it less often and moving away from it more frequently than from equivalent locations in the roadless area. Wood mice used road verges more frequently than virtual verges and moved more often parallel to the road than to the virtual road. Road crossings were more frequent after firebreak openings (strips of mowed land) in surrounding areas and near taller shrubs. Also, males used road verges more often than females. Differences on several movement patterns between areas and their trends within the road area can be explained mainly by the presence of the road and roadside vegetation management (e.g., firebreaks openings). We suggest roadside vegetation management practices (e.g., avoid land mowing; maintain vegetation strips) to promote the role of verges as refuges and/or corridors for small mammals.

Insect pollination services in actively and spontaneously restored quarries converge differently to natural reference ecosystem.

Ecological restoration has the potential to accelerate the recovery of biodiversity and ecosystem services in degraded ecosystems. However, current research queries whether active restoration is necessary. We evaluated plant-pollinator networks during spring at replicated sites within an actively restored quarry, at abandoned quarries undergoing spontaneous restoration, and within a natural reference area, to compare pollinator community composition and function. Overall, we aimed to assess which approach is more effective in rehabilitating pollination networks. We found that while both approaches allowed for the restoration of pollination function, active restoration provided faster recovery: pollination network structure was more similar to the reference ecosystem after 20-30 years of active restoration, than 40 years of natural succession in spontaneously restored areas. Different restoration approaches sustained distinct pollinator communities providing a similar service in different areas: honey bees played an important role in the natural area, bumblebees in the abandoned quarries and wild bees in the restored sites, suggesting a possible conflict between diverse wild bee communities and honey bee homogenized pollinator communities. In quarries, flower resource availability and diversity influenced networks' structural properties by constraining species interactions and composition. In spontaneously restored areas a rich herbaceous layer of ruderal species from early successional stages buffered against the shortage of flower resources at critical periods. Active restoration, though effective, should include practices that consider wild bee communities and mitigate flower resource scarcity. The use of "bridging" plants that flower in different periods, should be considered in active restoration programs to enhance the pollinator community.

Multispecies landscape functional connectivity enhances local bird species' diversity in a highly fragmented landscape.

Local species assemblages are likely the result of habitat and landscape filtering. However, there is still limited knowledge on how landscape functional connectivity complements habitat attributes in mediating local species assemblages in real-world fragmented landscapes. In this study, we set up a non-manipulative experimental design in a standard production forest to demonstrate how functional connectivity determines the spatial distribution of a bird community. We test single- and multispecies spatially explicit, landscape functional connectivity models framed within the circuit theory, considering also patch attributes describing habitat size and quality, to weight their effects on species occurrence and community assemblage. We found that single-species functional connectivity effects contributed positively for occurrence of each species. However, they rarely provided competing alternatives in predicting community parameters when compared to multispecies connectivity models. Incorporating multispecies connectivity showed more consistent effects for all community parameters, than single-species models, since the overlap between species' dispersal abilities in the landscape shows poor agreement. Habitat size and quality, though less important, were also determinant in explaining community parameters while possibly relating to the provision of suitable nesting and foraging conditions. Both habitat and landscape filters concur to govern community assembly, though likely influencing different processes: while landscape connectivity determines which species can reach a patch, habitat quality determines which species settle in the patch. Our results also suggest that surrogating multispecies connectivity from single species has potential to source bias by assuming species perceive landscape and its barriers similarly. Inference on this issue must be gathered from as much species as possible.

Bottom-up cascading effects of quarry revegetation deplete bird-mediated seed dispersal services.

Quarrying activities cause profound modifications on ecosystems, such as removal of vegetation cover, biodiversity loss and depletion of ecosystem services. Ecological restoration stands as a solution to revert such effects. Concomitantly, awareness is currently being given on ecosystem services and ecological processes to evaluate restoration efficiency. The objective of the study was to assess restoration success in a quarry subjected to restoration practices for the last 40 years involving the plantation of native Mediterranean vegetation and the non-native Aleppo pine Pinus halepensis. The study was carried out by assessing the effectiveness of seed dispersal service provided by birds in the restored quarry by comparing this service to neighbouring natural (shrubland) and other semi-natural areas (oak-pine mixed open and Aleppo pine forest) present at the landscape. For this purpose, we explored bird composition structure and seed dispersal networks using point counts and faecal samples of mist-netted birds. We also collected vegetation structure data and explored its effect on bird community composition. Our results showed that bird abundance in the restored quarry was significantly lower, and its bird community was compositionally different than natural shrubland and semi-natural areas. For instance, seed-dispersing birds, woody and shrub/ground foragers and partially migrators were the most affected groups at the restored area. Bird community composition and their traits were likely driven by vegetation characteristics, with higher native vegetation cover and fruit richness promoting higher bird abundance and Aleppo pine cover negatively influencing seed-dispersing birds. Concurrently, seed dispersal network in the restored quarry was less complex than in other areas. Seed dispersal services in the restored quarry were below the reported values for neighbouring natural and semi-natural areas and are likely driven by the low abundance of seed-dispersing birds. We consider that the causes affecting this group's low abundance can be related to revegetation measures favouring Aleppo pine, combined with a shallow soil depth and poor soil quality, which may have constrained native vegetation development. We conclude that seed dispersal services at the quarry are depleted, which may suggest a low restoration success concerning ecosystem functioning. Our results strengthen that quarry revegetation with non-native species must be avoided, since it alters bird community composition, and consequently, affects seed dispersal service provided by birds.

Road verges provide connectivity for small mammals: A case study with wood mice (Apodemus sylvaticus) in an agro-silvo pastoral system.

Roads disrupt landscape connectivity for many terrestrial mammals. These infrastructures can be barriers to movement thereby threatening population persistence. Nonetheless, small mammals may use road verges as habitat or corridor, thus increasing migration across intensively managed landscapes. However, in well-preserved habitats where road verges show a similar vegetation structure to surrounding areas, their role is still unknown. Road verges would have an important role as fine-scale connectivity providers for small mammals in a well-preserved habitat depending on land management on road surroundings. We aimed to quantify the effects of road verges and paved lanes on the fine-scale landscape connectivity for the wood mouse (Apodemus sylvaticus) in a well-preserved Mediterranean woodland. Additionally, we assessed the impact on connectivity of vegetation cutting on verges and of management in surrounding areas (i.e. firebreaks, grazing, ploughing and cork stripping). We quantified connectivity using graph theory based on two years of capture-recapture data. We compared a set of connectivity metrics (derived from the probability of connectivity index) in a road area and in a virtual roadless scenario. We found that the presence of the road reduced overall fine-scale landscape connectivity, acting as a partial barrier for wood mice movement. However, verges had a key role in promoting movement on road surroundings. Vegetation cutting on verges, and land ploughing in the surrounding landscape were the only management activities compromising connectivity. Our study supports the already known role of road verges as habitat corridors for small mammals. However, it goes beyond existing knowledge by quantifying the connectivity enhancement provided by road verges and demonstrating that this role is highly relevant even in well-preserved landscapes. Therefore, our findings emphasize the critical role of road verges and suggest important management options to enhance landscape connectivity for small mammals.

Factors influencing predator roadkills: The availability of prey in road verges.

Road mortality is the most noticeable effect of roads on wildlife. Road verges may provide important refuges for small mammals and rabbits, particularly when roads cross intensive agricultural or grazed areas. In these circumstances, the increasing use of verges by prey species may attract predators to road surroundings increasing the risk of roadkill. The aim of this study was to quantify the role of prey availability (small mammals and rabbits) on predator road casualties, taking into account road and surrounding landscape characteristics. We analyzed this effect on different predator species, such as, snakes, owls and mammal carnivores. The study took place in a 10 km stretch of a National Road (EN4) in southern Portugal. Relationships among predator mortality and explanatory variables (prey abundance, landscape characteristics, and road verge features) were evaluated using Multivariate Redundancy Analysis (RDA) followed by a variation partitioning. Our results show that, although landscape features explained most of the mortality variation, the prey availability was also very important. Roadkills of Montpellier snake and Egyptian mongoose are strongly associated with wild rabbit abundance on verges, while mortality of stone marten, barn owl and tawny owl is related with wood mouse abundance, Mediterranean forest (montado) density, and verge shrub density. Implications for verge management and implementation of mitigation actions are discussed. We suggest vegetation removal in verges to decrease shelter and food availability for prey, and/or the promotion of habitat for prey in areas distant from roads.

Habitat quality of the woolly spider monkey (Brachyteles hypoxanthus).

This study examines how habitat structure affects the home range use of a group of Brachyteles hypoxanthus in the Brigadeiro State Park, Brazil. It has been reported that most of the annual feeding time of woolly spider monkeys is spent eating leaves, but they prefer fruits when available. We hypothesise that the protein-to-fibre ratio (PF; best descriptor of habitat quality for folivorous primates) is a better descriptor of habitat quality and abundance for these primates than the structural attributes of forests (basal area is the best descriptor of habitat quality for frugivorous primates of Africa and Asia). We evaluated plant community structure, successional status, and PF of leaf samples from the dominant tree populations, both within the core and from a non-core area of the home range of our study group. Forest structure was a combination of stem density and basal area of dominant tree populations. The core area had larger trees, a higher forest basal area, and higher stem density than the non-core area. Mean PF did not differ significantly between these sites, although PF was influenced by differences in tree regeneration guilds. Large-bodied monkeys could be favoured by later successional stages of forests because larger trees and denser stems prevent the need for a higher expenditure of energy for locomotion as a consequence of vertical travel when the crowns of trees are disconnected in early successional forests. Forest structure variables (such as basal area of trees) driven by succession influence woolly spider monkey abundance in a fashion similar to frugivorous monkeys of Asia and Africa, and could explain marked differences in ranging behaviour and home range use by B. hypoxanthus.