Conservation implications of a mismatch between data availability and demographic impact

Cost-effective use of limited conservation resources requires understanding which data most contribute to alleviating biodiversity declines. Interventions might reasonably prioritise life-cycle transitions with the greatest influence on population dynamics, yet some contributing vital rates are particularly challenging to document. This risks managers making decisions without sufficient empirical coverage of the spatiotemporal variation experienced by the species. Here, we aimed to explore whether the number of studies contributing estimates for a given life-stage transition aligns with that transition's demographic impact on population growth rate, λ. We parameterised a matrix population model using meta-analysis of vital rates for the common eider (Somateria mollissima), an increasingly threatened yet comparatively data-rich species of seaduck, for which some life stages are particularly problematic to study. Female common eiders exhibit intermittent breeding, with some established breeders skipping one or more years between breeding attempts. Our meta-analysis yielded a breeding propensity of 0.72, which we incorporated into our model with a discrete and reversible ‘nonbreeder’ stage (to which surviving adults transition with a probability of 0.28). The transitions between breeding and nonbreeding states had twice the influence on λ than fertility (summed matrix-element elasticities of 24% and 11%, respectively), whereas almost 15 times as many studies document components of fertility than breeding propensity (n = 103 and n = 7, respectively). The implications of such mismatches are complex because the motivations for feasible on-the-ground conservation actions may be different from what is needed to reduce uncertainty in population projections. Our workflow could form an early part of the toolkit informing future investment of finite resources, to avoid repeated disconnects between data needs and availability thwarting evidence-led conservation.

breeding propensity, common eider, matrix-element elasticity, meta-analysis, seaduck, vital rate

10.1002/ece3.10269

2045-7758

e10269

Nicol‐Harper, Alex

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Doncaster, C. Patrick

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Hilton, Geoff M.

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Wood, Kevin A.

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Ezard, Thomas H. G.

a143a893-07d0-4673-a2dd-cea2cd7e1374

18 July 2023

Nicol‐Harper, Alex

b4d622c9-7cf5-4fd7-9221-128f29ade156

Doncaster, C. Patrick

0eff2f42-fa0a-4e35-b6ac-475ad3482047

Hilton, Geoff M.

77c4be6c-31ea-49c6-8e20-55f21e16384c

Wood, Kevin A.

9b23af3a-4b22-459a-9fb8-a80ea690be01

Ezard, Thomas H. G.

a143a893-07d0-4673-a2dd-cea2cd7e1374

Nicol‐Harper, Alex, Doncaster, C. Patrick, Hilton, Geoff M., Wood, Kevin A. and Ezard, Thomas H. G. (2023) Conservation implications of a mismatch between data availability and demographic impact. Ecology and Evolution, 13 (7), e10269, [e10269]. (doi:10.1002/ece3.10269).

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Accepted/In Press date: 6 June 2023

Published date: 18 July 2023

Additional Information: Funding Information: Funding: This work was supported by a UK Natural Environmental Research Council SPITFIRE DTP award [grant number NE/L002531/1] to ANH. For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a CC BY public copyright licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising from this submission. The authors thank all respondents to the call for data, particularly Heather Major & Tony Diamond, Aevar Petersen and Grigori Tertitski, who contributed previously unavailable data (Nicol-Harper et al., 2021b). We also thank R. Spake for advice on our meta-analysis methodology. ANH gratefully recognises the organisers and participants of the NERC Advanced Training Short Course on stage-based demography held in January 2019, whose feedback contributed to the development of this model. ANH also thanks the British Ornithologists' Union for a Member Travel Award which supported attendance to the European Ornithologists' Union Conference in August 2019, where an earlier iteration of this model was presented. All authors thank the anonymous reviewers whose suggestions significantly improved this work. Funding Information: Funding: This work was supported by a UK Natural Environmental Research Council SPITFIRE DTP award [grant number NE/L002531/1] to ANH. For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a CC BY public copyright licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising from this submission. The authors thank all respondents to the call for data, particularly Heather Major & Tony Diamond, Aevar Petersen and Grigori Tertitski, who contributed previously unavailable data (Nicol‐Harper et al., 2021b ). We also thank R. Spake for advice on our meta‐analysis methodology. ANH gratefully recognises the organisers and participants of the NERC Advanced Training Short Course on stage‐based demography held in January 2019, whose feedback contributed to the development of this model. ANH also thanks the British Ornithologists' Union for a Member Travel Award which supported attendance to the European Ornithologists' Union Conference in August 2019, where an earlier iteration of this model was presented. All authors thank the anonymous reviewers whose suggestions significantly improved this work. Publisher Copyright: © 2023 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Keywords: breeding propensity, common eider, matrix-element elasticity, meta-analysis, seaduck, vital rate

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