In my previous post I said I was going to look into ways to get involved in spider conservation- I’ve done that, and there are definitely ways to get involved, but not in the same numbers that I usually see with other conservation topics. My guess is that spider conservation is both relatively new and […]
Archive for the ‘endangered species’ Tag
Along came a spider conservation program…
Tracing the thread
When I started looking into spider conservation, I wasn’t sure how much information I would find, but I assumed that there was a growing body of literature. And that is accurate, although I was surprised to see how much of it was about the impact of land management practices on spider communities in general. There […]
A tangled web?
For people who know me, this month’s topic may come as something of a surprise- I am not good with spiders, I do not like them close to me, I get creeped out watching them move. But I’m also trying to be open-minded when it comes to conservation concerns- just because I don’t personally like […]
Nuts for Squirrels
When I started looking into opportunities to get involved with squirrel conservation, I expected to see many efforts that focus on the European Red Squirrel in the UK and Ireland- and my expectations were more than met. In fact, I had to do a little digging to find groups that even mentioned other squirrel species, […]
Building a better squirrel conservation program
In my last post, I provided a long (and depressing) list of squirrel species and subspecies facing challenging situations. The very good news is that there are quite a few people conducting research to better understand exactly why certain populations are in decline and how to most effectively reverse those trends. Not all of their […]
The many faces of Prof. Squirrel
When I said last week that I was interested in squirrel conservation, I had imagined that I would find a lot of papers talking about the decline of European red squirrels (Sciurus vulgaris) in response to the presence of gray squirrels in the UK- and, I did. But I also found so much more: more […]
What ever happened to Squirrel Nutkin?
Last week I read a news story about an investigation launched by police after a squirrel was shot in Scotland- the issue here is not just that a squirrel was shot, but that a red squirrel was shot. In the UK, red squirrels are a protected species and various organizations are engaged in trying to […]
Making room for large carnivores
Over the last few posts, I’ve mentioned that a number of groups around the world are working to reduce human-carnivore conflict- some of those strategies have been more successful than others, but we do have a better sense of what helps limit conflict, both from the human and the wildlife perspective. To get insight into […]
The large carnivore in the room
In the past few years there has been an emphasis on assessing what makes a carnivore conservation effort successful (or not) and what the long-term prospects are for the variety of strategies in use. The reality is that there is no magic bullet or guarantee of success, but we certainly have a better sense of […]
If you give a mouse a conservation program…
As you might expect after looking through my blog posts from this month, I found a pretty distinct dichotomy in terms of conservation programs that deal with rodents: some projects are trying to get rid of them, and others are trying to protect them. Either way, there are a variety of options for us in […]