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ANNOUNCEMENTS

Certification Program

The Society for Ecological Restoration International is designing a certification program for professionals in the field of ecological restoration. The first stage of design involves a survey of experienced individuals in order to identify the qualifications (such as education, formal or informal training, experience, and mentoring) of restoration practitioners. The first phase of the survey will entail individual interviews of 20-30 minutes conducted by the Center for Association Resources. The second phase of the survey will be a mass email campaign. If you would like to participate in the first phase, please contact Sasha Alexander (sasha@ser.org).

Publications

HIV / AIDS and the Environment is the topic of a recently published special issue of the journal Population and Environment, now available online at www.Springerlink.com. A collection of research articles and reviews are presented examining relationships between HIV / AIDS and conservation strategies, natural resource use, land tenure, and food security.

New Open Source ConserveOnline

ConserveOnline (www.ConserveOnline.org) has launched an overhaul of the free online tools supporting knowledge-flow and coordination between environment and conservation efforts around the world. The new system is the product of collaboration among The Nature Conservancy, Oracle, and the original developers of Plone, an open source content management system that was released in 2001. The global community of open source web developers is encouraged to contribute and enhance this new platform. ConserveOnline contains free tools for document management, networking, and shared learning. Please contact Jonathan Adams (jadams@tnc.org) with any questions.

Press Release: Reliance on unverifiable observations hinders successful conservation of rare, elusive wildlife species

Nearly any evidence of the occurrence of a rare or elusive wildlife species has the tendency to generate a stir. Case in point: in February 2008, remote cameras unexpectedly captured the images of a wolverine in the central Sierra Nevada of the western United States, an area from which the species was believed to be extinct since 1922. But frustratingly few observations prove to be so conclusive. So what, then, are managers to make of unverifiable observations, especially those that are not diagnostic?

Researchers from the U.S. Forest Service's Pacific Northwest and Rocky Mountain Research Stations examined three cases of biological misunderstandings in which unverifiable, anecdotal observations were accepted as empirical evidence. Ultimately, they found that this acceptance adversely affected conservation goals for the fisher in the Pacific states, the wolverine in California, and the Ivory-billed Woodpecker in the southeastern United States by vastly overestimating their range and abundance. The researchers' findings appear in a recent issue of BioScience.

"These cases revealed that anecdotal data can be important to conservation by supplying preliminary data, such as early warnings of population declines," said Kevin McKelvey, the study's lead investigator, "but conclusions regarding the presence of rare or elusive species must be based on verifiable physical evidence."

In their study, the researchers found that the dependability of species occurrence data depends on both the intrinsic reliability of each record as well as the rarity of the species in question, because the proportion of false positives increases as a species becomes rarer. To help managers determine the suitability of evidence in conservation decisionmaking, the researchers developed a gradient of evidentiary standards for data that increases in rigor along with species' rarity. This "sliding scale" of standards might permit the use of anecdotal data, the least reliable form, in decisionmaking when the species in question is common, for example, but require indisputable physical evidence for a species thought to be extinct. The authors also encourage professional societies to debate evidentiary standards for their organisms of interest and to establish rules for using occurrence data.

"Over the years, many state and federal management agencies have placed a lot of emphasis on compiling sighting reports and other unverifiable wildlife observations" said Keith Aubry, one of the study's co-investigators. "Unfortunately, the uncritical use of such observations has largely impeded conservation goals, not advanced them."

For more information, contact Yasmeen Sands, ysands@fs.fed.us, 1 (206) 732-7823. Article citation: McKelvey, K.S., K.B. Aubry, and M.K. Schwartz. 2008. Using anecdotal occurrence data for rare or elusive species: the illusion of reality and a call for evidentiary standards. BioScience 58:549-555.

Meetings

The National Council for Science and the Environment (NCSE) welcomes you to participate in the ninth National Conference on Science, Policy, and the Environment: Biodiversity in a Rapidly Changing World. This interactive conference will be held 8-10 December, 2008 in Washington, D.C. Plan on joining in the discussion with government officials, scientists, businesses, and nongovernmental organizations. For more information visit www.ncseonline.org/conference/biodiversity. Registration will open in early September with an early registration discount.

The 24th Tall Timbers Fire Ecology Conference, Future of Prescribed Fire: Public Awareness, Health & Safety, will be held 11-15 January 2009 in Tallahassee, Florida, USA. Topics will include tradeoffs between prescribed fire and wildfire, carbon sequestration, and ecosystem function and restoration. Oral and poster presenters will have the opportunity to publish a paper in the peer-reviewed proceedings. The deadline for submission of abstracts is 30 September. Complete information is available at www.talltimbers.org/FEconference.

An international conference on the challenges of climate change, Beyond Kyoto: Addressing the Challenges of Climate Change -- Science Meets Industry, Policy and the Public, will be held 5-7 March, 2009 in Aarhus, Denmark. The objective of the conference is to advance knowledge that can inform regulatory frameworks, innovation, and the development of new technologies for sustainable development and eco-efficiency. The conference will have a strong focus on species and ecosystem diversity. For more information, visit http://klima.au.dk/index.php?id=konferencebeyondkyoto.

The 2009 joint meeting of the Wilson Ornithological Society and Association of Field Ornithologists will be held 8-12 April 2009 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. The meeting will be hosted by the National Aviary and Powdermill Nature Reserve. Abstract submission will open in the third quarter of 2008 and a meeting Web site will be online soon. For more information contact Todd Katzner, Department of Conservation and Field Research, National Aviary, 700 Arch St., Allegheny Commons West, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 16212, USA, 1 (412) 323-7235 x210, todd.katzner@aviary.org.

The Association for the Study of Literature and Environment invites proposals for its eighth Biennial Conference, Island Time: The Fate of Place in a Wired, Warming World, which will be held 3-6 June 2009 at the University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. The organizers seek proposals for papers, panels, roundtables, workshops, and other public presentations connecting language, nature, and culture. Interdisciplinary approaches are welcome: readings of environmentally inflected fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction and proposals from outside the academic humanities, including submissions from artists, writers, practitioners, activists, and colleagues in the social and natural sciences. For additional information, see http://asle.uvic.ca/.

The 10th International Congress of Ecology, Ecology in a Changing Climate: Two Hemispheres-One Globe, will be held 16-21 August in Brisbane, Australia. The Congress will be hosted by the Ecological Society of Australia in partnership with the New Zealand Ecological Society, and is the first International Congress of Ecology to be held in the southern hemisphere. For more information visit www.intecol10.org.

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