Fossil pollen from dipterocarps show shared floristic heritage between Asia and Africa

A century of ringing records implies that reed warblers use the Earth’s magnetic field as a stop sign to identify their natal breeding sites.

EU grants restrict U.K. and Swiss research Rules on first grants from Horizon Europe highlight ongoing diplomatic disputes

Coral reefs receiving larvae from highly connected dispersal corridors are associated with high fish species richness.

Mourad Zemouri, Lydia Asloune, Aida Adrar, Abdelouhab Bouchareb & Abdelazize Franck Bougaham

Michael M Williams, Ulf Ottosson, Talatu Tende & Justus P Deikumah

Protected area networks help species respond to climate warming. However, the contribution of a site's environmental and conservation-relevant characteristics to these responses is not well understood. We investigated how composition of nonbreeding waterbird communities (97 species) in the European Union Natura 2000 (N2K) network (3018 sites) changed in response to increases in temperature over 25 years in 26 European countries. We measured community reshuffling based on abundance time series collected under the International Waterbird Census relative to N2K sites’ conservation targets, funding, designation period, and management plan status. Waterbird community composition in sites explicitly designated to protect them and with management plans changed more quickly in response to climate warming than in other N2K sites. Temporal community changes were not affected by the designation period despite greater exposure to temperature increase inside late-designated N2K sites. Sites funded under the LIFE program had lower climate-driven community changes than sites that did not received LIFE funding. Our findings imply that efficient conservation policy that helps waterbird communities respond to climate warming is associated with sites specifically managed for waterbirds.

Wetland bird species have been declining in population size worldwide as climate warming and land-use change affect their suitable habitats. We used species distribution models (SDMs) to predict changes in range dynamics for 64 non-passerine wetland birds breeding in Europe, including range size, position of centroid, and margins. We fitted the SDMs with data collected for the first European Breeding Bird Atlas and climate and land-use data to predict distributional changes over a century (the 1970s–2070s). The predicted annual changes were then compared to observed annual changes in range size and range centroid over a time period of 30 years using data from the second European Breeding Bird Atlas. Our models successfully predicted ca. 75% of the 64 bird species to contract their breeding range in the future, while the remaining species (mostly southerly breeding species) were predicted to expand their breeding ranges northward. The northern margins of southerly species and southern margins of northerly species, both, predicted to shift northward. Predicted changes in range size and shifts in range centroids were broadly positively associated with the observed changes, although some species deviated markedly from the predictions. The predicted average shift in core distributions was ca. 5 km yr−1 towards the north (5% northeast, 45% north, and 40% northwest), compared to a slower observed average shift of ca. 3.9 km yr−1. Predicted changes in range centroids were generally larger than observed changes, which suggests that bird distribution changes may lag behind environmental changes leading to 'climate debt'. We suggest that predictions of SDMs should be viewed as qualitative rather than quantitative outcomes, indicating that care should be taken concerning single species. Still, our results highlight the urgent need for management actions such as wetland creation and restoration to improve wetland birds' resilience to the expected environmental changes in the future.

Die Vogelwarte Sempach hat die Rote Liste der gefährdeten Brutvogelarten der Schweiz im Auftrag des Bafu revidiert. 40 Prozent der 205 beurteilten Vogelarten wurden auf die Rote Liste gesetzt. Das sind gleich viele wie 2010, aber es gibt ein klares Warnsignal: Der Anteil der potenziell gefährdeten Arten ist nochmals grösser geworden. Von Peter Knaus /

Nouvelle Liste rouge des oiseaux de Suisse

La Station ornithologique de Sempach a révisé la Liste rouge des espèces d'oiseaux nicheurs menacées de Suisse sur mandat de l'OFEV. 40 pour cent des 205 espèces d'oiseaux évaluées ont été placées sur la liste rouge. C'est le même nombre qu'en 2010, mais il y a un signal d'alarme clair : la part des espèces potentiellement menacées a encore augmenté. Par Peter Knaus /