Reconstructing mechanisms of extinctions to guide mammal conservation biogeography

作者：Sean Tomlinson, Mark V. Lomolino, John C. Z. Woinarski, Brett P. Murphy, Elizabeth H. Reed, Christopher N. Johnson, Sarah Legge, Kristofer M. Helgen, Stuart C. Brown, Damien A. Fordham · 发表于：Journal of Biogeography · 年份：2023 · DOI：10.1111/jbi.14616 · 被引用次数：9 · 研究领域：Species Distribution and Climate Change、Wildlife Ecology and Conservation、Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies

Abstract An emerging research program on population and geographic range dynamics of Australia's mammals illustrates an approach to better understand and respond to geographic range collapses of threatened wildlife in general. In 1788, Europeans colonized an Australia with a diverse and largely endemic mammal fauna, where many species that are now extinct or threatened were common and widespread. Subsequent population declines, range collapses and extinctions were caused by introduced predators and herbivores, altered land use, modified fire regimes and the synergies between these threats. Declines in population and range size continue for many Australian mammals despite legislative protection and conservation interventions. Here, we propose an approach that integrates museum data and other historical records into process‐explicit macroecological models to better resolve mammal distributions and abundances as they were at European arrival. We then illustrate how this integrative approach can identify the likely synergistic mechanisms causing mammal population declines across these and other landscapes. This emerging research approach, undertaken with fine temporal and spatial resolution, but at large geographic scales, will provide valuable insights into the different pathways to, and drivers of, extinction. Such insights may, in turn, underpin conservation strategies based on a process‐explicit understanding of population decline and range collapse under alternative scenario...