Biodiversité

A l'aide de micros, des scientifiques enregistrent les sons des écosystèmes naturels. Après les océans et les forêts, une équipe de l'université de Bristol (Royaume-Uni) a dévoilé le monde sonore mystérieux... des mares de la campagne anglaise. Un "orchestre" étonnant.

Une étude confirme le déclin alarmant de ce groupe d’insectes parmi les mieux étudiés au monde, qui constitue un indicateur précieux de l’état de la biodiversité.

Au Royaume-Uni, des scientifiques ont confirmé l’effondrement des populations d’insectes volants en observant… les plaques d’immatriculation des automobilistes.
Les organismes de conservation de la nature Kent Wildlife Trust et The Invertebrate Conservation Trust (Buglife) ont publié, le 6 mai, les résultats d’une étude montrant que le nombre d’insectes volants avait diminué de près de 60 % dans le pays, entre 2004 et 2021.

Les ministres de l'Atlantique du Nord-Est se sont réunis pour renouveler et étendre leurs engagements en faveur de la protection et de la conservation de l'Atlantique du Nord-Est et de ses ressources.

Les 15 pays représentés à la réunion sont tous signataires de la convention OSPAR, ainsi que l'Union européenne. La réunion a désigné une nouvelle aire marine protégée (AMP) en haute mer pour la protection des oiseaux de mer plus grande que la masse terrestre du Royaume-Uni et de l'Allemagne réunis. Une nouvelle Stratégie pour le milieu marin de l’Atlantique du Nord-est a également été adoptée.

The naturalist uses a UN event to call on world leaders to do more to protect nature.

Craig Bennett, chief executive of The Wildlife Trusts, said "a much greater level of urgent action" was needed to put nature into recovery, including rescuing wildlife sites currently in decline.

The government figure of 26% includes national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty (AONBs), which are more about how our landscape looks as opposed to the state of nature within them, he said.

He told BBC News: "The reality is, at best what's being managed for nature at the moment is only 10%. Even according to the government's own advisers on nature, they say half of that is in a poor condition, so it's nearer 5%. We've got a mountain to climb if we're really going to put nature into recovery in this country and reach the Prime Minister's target by 2030."

At the IUCN World Conservation Congress in Hawaii, delegates have passed a motion calling for better protection and restoration of the world’s peatlands.

The latest State of Nature Report rings yet another alarm bell on the biodiversity crisis in the UK, showing major declines in many species since monitoring began in 1970. Since this date, species have declined by 19% on average and one in six are now at risk of being lost in the UK.

Le projet SAlmonid MAnagement Round the CHannel (SAMARCH) s’est clôturé les 14 et 15 mars 2023 à Southampton (Royaume-Uni). Ce projet franco-anglais était destiné à acquérir de nouvelles informations dans les estuaires et les eaux côtières pour améliorer la protection de nos saumons et truites de mer sauvages menacés.

Achieving the goal to protect 30% of UK land and seas for nature by 2030.This report from the British Ecological Society (published 22 April 2022) examines the Prime Minister’s pledge to protect 30% of UK land and seas by 2030 to support nature recovery.

Marine protected areas, or MPAs as they’re more commonly called, are very simple. Areas of the sea are set aside where certain activities – usually fishing – are banned or restricted. Ideally, these MPAs might be placed around particularly vibrant habitats that support lots of different species, like seagrass beds or coral reefs. By preventing fishing gear such as towed seabed trawls from sweeping through these environments, the hope is that marine life will be allowed to recover.

When used well, they can be very effective.

When an expert volunteer is walking through a sunny meadow recording butterflies or searching by torchlight for newts, it can seem a long way from the negotiating halls of Convention on Biological Diversity meetings or from civil servants drafting new legislation.

But trends in species’ abundance, distribution or extinction risk, derived from monitoring and recording schemes, have wide influence in developing and monitoring environmental strategies, agreements and legislation.

Individual species status assessments underpin the lists of priority species within each of the four UK countries. For example, the Environment (Wales) Act 2016 gives Welsh ministers the responsibility ‘maintain and enhance’ species on the Section 7 list. However, many uses of species’ status information come from creating composite measures giving an overview of the status of a taxonomic group, habitat type or of species in general.

Conservation charities estimate cost of dealing with predators at £2bn a year, and warns this may spiral without strong prevention measures

Richard Primack elaborates on this selection with: “In the United Kingdom, strategies to protect endangered species of plants and animals are more effective when climate change is included as a factor in habitat management.”