Deriving simple predictions from complex models to support environmental decision-making

Authored by Kevin A Wood, Richard A Stillman, John D Goss-Custard

Date Published: 2016

DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2015.04.014

Sponsors: Welsh Government Natural Resources Wales Scottish Natural Heritage Natural England

Platforms: No platforms listed

Model Documentation: Other Narrative

Model Code URLs: Model code not found

Abstract

Recent decades have seen great advances in ecological modelling and computing power, enabling ecologists to build increasingly detailed models to more accurately represent ecological systems. To better inform environmental decision-making, it is important that the predictions of these models are expressed in simple ways that are straightforward for stakeholders to comprehend and use. One way to achieve this is to predict threshold values for environmental perturbations (e.g. climate change, habitat modification, food loss, sea level rise) associated with negative impacts on individuals, populations, communities or ecosystems. These thresholds can be used by stakeholders to inform management and policy. In this paper we demonstrate how this approach can use individual-based models of birds, their prey and habitats, to provide the evidence-base for coastal bird conservation and shellfishery management. In particular, we show how such models can be used to identify threshold values for perturbations of food abundance that can impact negatively on bird populations. We highlight how environmental thresholds could be used more widely to inform management of species and habitats under environmental change. (C) 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Tags

Management Conservation Uk Individual-based ecology Disturbance Changing world Haematopus-ostralegus Shorebirds Shellfish Oystercatchers