The creation of the Fundação Brasileira para a Conservação da Natureza.

This study within the field of environmental history explores the scenario amid which the Fundação Brasileira para a Conservação da Natureza (Brazilian Foundation for Nature Conservation) was founded between 1958 and 1966; this important Brazilian non-governmental organization headquartered in Rio de Janeiro worked at the local, national, and international levels. Primary documentary sources were utilized, along with research of the related literature. The conclusions demonstrate the importance of non-governmental organizations predating this foundation, and the influence of conservationists on its establishment and current work.

'The very term mensuration sounds engineer-like': measurement and engineering authority in nineteenth-century river management.

Measurement was vital to nineteenth-century engineering. Focusing on the work of the Stevenson engineering firm in Scotland, this paper explores the processes by which engineers made their measurements credible and explains how measurement, as both a product and a practice, informed engineering decisions and supported claims to engineering authority. By examining attempts made to quantify, measure and map dynamic river spaces, the paper analyses the relationship between engineering experience and judgement and the generation of data that engineers considered to be 'tolerably correct'. While measurement created an abstract and simplified version of the river that accommodated prediction, this abstraction had to be connected to and made meaningful in real river space despite acknowledged limitations to measuring practice. In response, engineers drew on experience gained through the measuring process to support claims to authoritative knowledge. This combination of quantification and experience was then used to support interventions in debates over the proper use and management of rivers. This paper argues that measurement in nineteenth-century engineering served a dual function, producing both data and expertise, which were both significant in underpinning engineering authority and facilitating engineers' intervention in decision making for river management.

Larisa DeSantis.

Interview with Larisa DeSantis, who uses fossil mammals to study ancient climate change and extinctions, with a view to understand past and present ecosystems, at Vanderbilt University.

Beyond the limit: carrying capacity (K) and the holism/reductionism debate.

As the debate about holism and reductionism in ecology has ebbed in the last twenty years, this article aims to reassess the traditional opposition between holistic and reductionist epistemologies during the development of population biology. The history of the notion of carrying capacity, the upper demographic limit of a viable population, will be analyzed as a paradigmatic case of the progressive imposition of reductionist strategies, from both an epistemological and a semantic point of view, since the middle of the twentieth century. Then, Richard Looijen's reduction of the carrying capacity concept to the niche partitioning theory will be assessed and rebuked for both empirical and logical reasons. Eventually, some recent "weak" and "hard" emergent conceptualizations of the notion of carrying capacity, in logistic map models or in coupled niche-population systems, will be presented in order to show how they call into question the nature and the use of the notion of carrying capacity as a predefined ecological limit.

Widespread reforestation before European influence on Amazonia.

An estimated 90 to 95% of Indigenous people in Amazonia died after European contact. This population collapse is postulated to have caused decreases in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations at around 1610 CE, as a result of a wave of land abandonment in the wake of disease, slavery, and warfare, whereby the attendant reversion to forest substantially increased terrestrial carbon sequestration. On the basis of 39 Amazonian fossil pollen records, we show that there was no synchronous reforestation event associated with such an atmospheric carbon dioxide response after European arrival in Amazonia. Instead, we find that, at most sites, land abandonment and forest regrowth began about 300 to 600 years before European arrival. Pre-European pandemics, social strife, or environmental change may have contributed to these early site abandonments and ecological shifts.

People have shaped most of terrestrial nature for at least 12,000 years.

Archaeological and paleoecological evidence shows that by 10,000 BCE, all human societies employed varying degrees of ecologically transformative land use practices, including burning, hunting, species propagation, domestication, cultivation, and others that have left long-term legacies across the terrestrial biosphere. Yet, a lingering paradigm among natural scientists, conservationists, and policymakers is that human transformation of terrestrial nature is mostly recent and inherently destructive. Here, we use the most up-to-date, spatially explicit global reconstruction of historical human populations and land use to show that this paradigm is likely wrong. Even 12,000 y ago, nearly three quarters of Earth's land was inhabited and therefore shaped by human societies, including more than 95% of temperate and 90% of tropical woodlands. Lands now characterized as "natural," "intact," and "wild" generally exhibit long histories of use, as do protected areas and Indigenous lands, and current global patterns of vertebrate species richness and key biodiversity areas are more strongly associated with past patterns of land use than with present ones in regional landscapes now characterized as natural. The current biodiversity crisis can seldom be explained by the loss of uninhabited wildlands, resulting instead from the appropriation, colonization, and intensifying use of the biodiverse cultural landscapes long shaped and sustained by prior societies. Recognizing this deep cultural connection with biodiversity will therefore be essential to resolve the crisis.

Hamster numbers: biopolitics and animal agency in the dutch fields, circa 1870-present.

Numbers of European hamsters (Cricetus cricetus) in the Dutch Province of Limburg have been subject to much scrutiny and controversy. In the late nineteenth century, policymakers who considered them too numerous (and invasive) set up eradication programs. In the second half of the twentieth century, even when its domestic relative (Mesocricetus auratus) increasingly circulated as a pet in urban spaces, the numbers of European hamsters in the rural areas collapsed. Large-scale preservation campaigns and reintroduction programs ensued. According to some media, all this has turned the European hamster into the most expensive undomesticated animal of the Netherlands. A whole network of institutions became involved to save the species - ranging from local activist organizations, over zoos and universities, to federal ministries and international organizations. The interactions between the Dutch and 'their' hamsters, this article argues, were inscribed in various forms of biopolitics. The article highlights the changing discursive framings and spatial practices that have shaped the management of Cricetus cricetus over time and calls attention to the diversity of living and non-living agents that produced the multispecies choreographies of the present-day Limburg landscape. Finally, it alerts us to the (sometimes-paradoxical) kinds of agency that reside in the numbers of non-human animals.

Population history of chimpanzees introduced to Lake Victoria's Rubondo Island.

Between 1966 to 1969, Bernhard Grzimek (Frankfurt Zoological Society, FZS) introduced chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) previously held in European institutions to Rubondo Island in Lake Victoria in Tanzania. Earlier publications report various numbers of released animals and that all founders originated from West Africa. We revise these assumptions through consultation of archived FZS records and genetic analyses of surviving descendants. Accordingly, 17 chimpanzees were transported to Africa in four waves, with male-female ratios of 3:8, 1:0, 1:0 and 2:2; one female died in transit. Thus, 16 chimpanzees were released in total. FZS and studbook records allocate a West African provenance to only 19% of the founders and a generic "Africa" origin to 56%. Still, studbook records render it unlikely that any of the founders were captive-born. In addition, our genetic analyses based on biological samples from the current descendants trace the geographical origin of their ancestors back to West Africa (P. t. verus) and Central Africa (P. t. troglodytes). Based on counts of individuals and night nests, we estimate that the population, since 1969, grew to around 35 individuals in 2014 (annual increase 3.3%). Thus, chimpanzees released onto a large forested island free from predators or hunting pressure, habitat destruction and conspecific competition can form a self-sustaining island population without human support.

Genetic and demographic history define a conservation strategy for earth's most endangered pinniped, the Mediterranean monk seal Monachus monachus.

The Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus) is a flagship species for marine conservation, but important aspects of its life history remain unknown. Concerns over imminent extinction motivated a nuclear DNA study of the species in its largest continuous subpopulation in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Despite recent evidence of partial subpopulation recovery, we demonstrate that there is no reason for complacency, as the species still shares several traits that are characteristic of a critically endangered species: Mediterranean monk seals in the eastern Mediterranean survive in three isolated and genetically depauperate population clusters, with small effective population sizes and high levels of inbreeding. Our results indicated male philopatry over short distances, which is unexpected for a polygynous mammal. Such a pattern may be explained by the species' unique breeding behavior, in which males defend aquatic territories near breeding sites, while females are often forced to search for new pupping areas. Immediate action is necessary to reverse the downward spiral of population decline, inbreeding accumulation and loss of genetic diversity. We propose concrete conservation measures for the Mediterranean monk seal focusing on reducing anthropogenic threats, increasing the population size and genetic diversity, and thus improving the long-term prospects of survival.

Taxonomic and functional turnover of Amazonian stream fish assemblages is determined by deforestation history and environmental variables at multiple scales

High rates of deforestation, either in the past or the present, affect many of the ecological processes in streams. Integrating deforestation history and the current landscape structure enhances the evaluation of ecological effects of land-use change. This is especially true when contemporary landscape conditions are similar but the temporal path to those conditions differs. One approach that has shown promise for evaluating biodiversity responses over time and space is the β-diversity partitioning, which combines taxonomic and functional trait-based approaches. We tested hypotheses related to stream fish assemblages' turnover in watersheds with different environmental conditions and deforestation histories. We sampled fish from 75 watersheds in the Machado River basin, Brazil, and environmental factors were quantified at multiple scales. Taxonomic turnover was higher than expected by chance, whereas functional turnover was lower than expected by the observed taxonomic turnover, indicating that deterministic processes are structuring these assemblages. The turnover, and the environmental factors differed among watersheds with different deforestation histories. Besides being scale-dependent, turnover patterns are also likely dependent on land use dynamics and involve time-lags.(AU)

Altas taxas de desmatamento, seja no passado ou no presente, afetam muitos processos ecológicos em riachos. Integrar o histórico do desmatamento à estrutura atual da paisagem melhora a avaliação dos efeitos ecológicos da mudança do uso do solo. Isto é especialmente verdadeiro quando as condições da paisagem contemporânea são semelhantes, mas seguiram trajetórias distintas. Uma abordagem promissora para avaliar as respostas da biodiversidade ao longo do tempo e espaço é a partição da diversidade-β, que combina abordagens taxonômica e funcional. Testamos hipóteses relacionadas à substituição das assembleias de peixes de riachos em microbacias com diferentes condições ambientais e histórias de desmatamento. Amostramos 75 microbacias na bacia do rio Machado, fatores ambientais foram quantificados em múltiplas escalas. A substituição taxonômica foi maior do que esperada pelo acaso, enquanto a substituição funcional foi menor do que o esperado pela substituição taxonômica, indicando que as assembleias são estruturadas por processos determinísticos. As substituições e fatores ambientais diferiram entre microbacias com históricos de desmatamento distintos. Além de serem escala-dependentes, os padrões de substituição provavelmente são dependentes da dinâmica do uso do solo, envolvendo defasagem temporal.(AU)

Historical and projected future range sizes of the world's mammals, birds, and amphibians.

Species' vulnerability to extinction is strongly impacted by their geographical range size. Formulating effective conservation strategies therefore requires a better understanding of how the ranges of the world's species have changed in the past, and how they will change under alternative future scenarios. Here, we use reconstructions of global land use and biomes since 1700, and 16 possible climatic and socio-economic scenarios until the year 2100, to map the habitat ranges of 16,919 mammal, bird, and amphibian species through time. We estimate that species have lost an average of 18% of their natural habitat range sizes thus far, and may lose up to 23% by 2100. Our data reveal that range losses have been increasing disproportionately in relation to the area of destroyed habitat, driven by a long-term increase of land use in tropical biodiversity hotspots. The outcomes of different future climate and land use trajectories for global habitat ranges vary drastically, providing important quantitative evidence for conservation planners and policy makers of the costs and benefits of alternative pathways for the future of global biodiversity.

A 29-year retrospective analysis of koala rescues in New South Wales, Australia.

The koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) is currently listed by both the IUCN and the Australian Governments' Threatened Species Scientific Committee as vulnerable to extinction with an overall decreasing population trend. It is unknown exactly how many koalas remain in the wild, but it is known that habitat fragmentation and bushfires have ultimately contributed to the decline of the koala all over Australia. This novel study is a retrospective analysis of data over a 29-year period (1989-2018) using records for 12,543 sightings and clinical care admissions for wild koalas from the major koala hot-spots (Port Stephens, port Macquarie and Lismore) in New South Wales, Australia. This study aims to understand the long-term patterns and trends of key stressors that are contributing to the decline of koalas in New South Wales, and the synergic interactions of factors such as rescue location, sex and age of the koala, and if their decline is influenced progressively by year. The main findings of this retrospective analysis indicated that between all 3 rescue sites, the most common prognosis was disease, the most common disease was signs of chlamydia, and the most common outcome was release. The location where the highest number of koalas were found prior to being reported as sighted or admitted into clinical care was within the regional area of Lismore. Furthermore, sex was not a discriminating factor when it came to prognosis or outcome, but age was significant. Finally, incidents of disease were found to increase over long-term, whereas release decreased over time and euthanasia increased. The wealth of data available to us and the retrospective analysis enabled us in a way to 'zoom out' and reveal how the key environmental stressors have fluctuated spatially and temporally. In conclusion, our data provides strong evidence of added pressures of increased human population growth in metropolitan zones, which increases risks of acute environmental trauma and proximate stressors such as vehicle collisions and dog-attacks as well as increased sightings of virtually healthy koalas found in exposed environments. Thus our 'zoom out' approach provides support that there is an urgent need to strengthen on-ground management, bushfire control regimes, environmental planning and governmental policy actions that should hopefully reduce the proximate environmental stressors in a step wise approach. This will ensure that in the next decade (beyond 2020), NSW koalas will hopefully start to show reversed trends and patterns in exposure to environmental trauma and disease, and population numbers will return towards recovery and stability.

Earth 2020: Science, society, and sustainability in the Anthropocene.

April 22, 2020, marks the 50th anniversary of Earth Day and the birth of the modern environmental movement. As we look back over the past half century, we can gain significant insights into the evolving human imprint on Earth's biophysical systems, and the role of science and scientists in driving societal transitions toward greater sustainability. Science is a foundation for such transitions, but it is not enough. Rather, it is through wide collaborations across fields, including law, economics, and politics, and through direct engagement with civil society, that science can illuminate a better path forward. This is illustrated through a number of case studies highlighting the role of scientists in leading positive societal change, often in the face of strong oppositional forces. The past five decades reveal significant triumphs of environmental protection, but also notable failures, which have led to the continuing deterioration of Earth's natural systems. Today, more than ever, these historical lessons loom large as we face increasingly complex and pernicious environmental problems.