Protected areas in Britain are losing invertebrate species at the same rate as areas with no protection 鈥� prompting a call for more effective management of land assigned for conservation.
at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology and his colleagues looked at data from invertebrate monitoring carried out between 1990 and 2018 to work out how widespread species are within protected and unprotected zones. The study included 1238 species of ants, bees, hoverflies, ladybirds, spiders and wasps.
They found that while protected areas harboured greater species diversity than unprotected areas, over time, they lost species at the same rate, with pollinators such as bees and hoverflies particularly prone to losses.
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In both protected and unprotected areas, 27 per cent of species present were either lost or gained between 1990 and 2018, with losses far exceeding gains.
However, in contrast to previous work, common species showed a greater downward trend in areas with a conservation remit, posing a risk that the ecosystem services provided by widely distributed invertebrates, such as pollination and pest control, could be compromised.
鈥淭here鈥檚 likely a number of factors influencing protected areas, some of which are easier to rectify than others,鈥� says Cooke.
by the Joint Nature Conservation Committee, a UK government advisory body, suggest that around half of British protected areas are in an unfavourable condition, for reasons including overgrazing, undergrazing, disturbance or a lack of water.
鈥淸Inadequate] conservation management definitely plays a role and more effective, evidence-based management would be great, but there鈥檚 also a range of more pervasive pressures that need tackling more widely, such as climate change, pollution, insecticides and invasive species,鈥� says Cooke.
鈥淩educing these pressures across the landscape could benefit biodiversity both within and outside protected areas, as well as allowing successful conservation management within protected areas to reap its rewards.鈥�
Despite the downward trends, the study found the number of rare species in protected areas was twice that in unprotected areas, while pollinators that aren鈥檛 locally typical were also far more likely to be present.
鈥淏asically, pollinators are getting hammered by human pressures, but protected areas appear to be allowing them to move through the landscape and shift their ranges,鈥� says Cooke.
The research 鈥減oints at the landscape and institutional changes we urgently need鈥�, says , CEO of UK invertebrate conservation charity Buglife, noting that cuts to government agency budgets are affecting their ability to manage protected sites appropriately.
鈥淲orryingly, many of our most internationally endangered invertebrate species do not even occur within the protected sites network,鈥� says Shardlow.
鈥淚f we are to save these species before 2030, the work of designating important invertebrate areas as protected wildlife sites must start soon.鈥�
Biological Conservation
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