The Lodge

About: The Lodge is a based out in . It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Biodiversity. The organization has 258 authors who have published 394 publications receiving 17100 citations.

Large-scale variation in the temporal patterns of the frass fall of defoliating caterpillars in oak woodlands in Britain: implications for nesting woodland birds

Abstract: Capsule Frass fall was later and of longer duration in woods to the north and west of Britain compared with those in the southeast. Aims Defoliating caterpillars are a major food resource for woodland breeding birds and our aims were to quantify large-scale patterns in the timing and duration of the spring peak in abundance of these caterpillars in oak woodlands in Britain. Methods We deployed traps to collect caterpillar frass at regular intervals through spring in 19 oak woods distributed through England, Wales and Scotland. Models of the temporal patterns of the rate of frass fall were used to explore relationships with geographic variables and average local temperature. Results The date of peak frass fall in 2010 ranged from 20 May to 18 June and was significantly related to altitude, latitude and local April–May temperature. The duration of the peak ranged from 20 to 53 days and was correlated with the date of the peak and April–May temperature. Limited data from 2008 and 2009 indicated considerable ...

Mass aerial migration in the carabid beetle Notiophilus biguttatus

Abstract: Catches in traps at 12 and 200 m above ground, and observations with entomological radar, were used to document the high-altitude windborne movements of carabid beetles over agricultural land in south-east U.K. during July 1999, 2000, 2002, and 2004. 2. Notiophilus biguttatus (Fabricius) was found to be the most abundant species at altitude, with flights by reproductively immature adults resulting in millions of beetles passing through a 1 km 2 window during the brief migration period in July 2002. 3. This result was unexpected in view of the conclusions of an earlier, classic Dutch study by den Boer and colleagues that classified N. biguttatus as a poorly dispersing species that tended to become isolated in remnants of natural habitat. 4. Reasons for the discrepancy between the two studies are discussed. It is hypothesised that the high mobility seen in the N. biguttatus populations results from a recent adaptation of the beetle's migration syndrome allowing it to exploit the mosaic of temporary habitat patches making up the increasingly intensive agroecosystems of northern Europe.

Forecasting the combined effects of climate and land use change on Mexican bats

Abstract: Aim: Climate and land use change are among the most important threatening processes driving biodiversity loss, especially in the tropics. Although the potential impacts of each threat have been widely studied in isolation, few studies have assessed the impacts of climate and land cover change in combination. Here, we evaluate the exposure of a large mammalian clade, bats, to multiple scenarios of environmental change and dispersal to understand potential consequences for biodiversity conservation. / Location: Mexico. / Methods: We used ensemble species distribution models to forecast changes in environmental suitability for 130 bat species that occur in Mexico by 2050s under four dispersal assumptions and four combined climate and land use change scenarios. We identified regions with the strongest projected impacts for each scenario and assessed the overlap across scenarios. / Results: The combined effects of climate and land use change will cause an average reduction in environmental suitability for 51% of the species across their range, regardless of scenario. Overall, species show a mean decrease in environmental suitability in at least 46% of their current range in all scenarios of change and dispersal. Climate scenarios had a higher impact on species environmental suitability than land use scenarios. There was a spatial overlap of 43% across the four environmental change scenarios for the regions projected to have the strongest impacts. / Main conclusions: Combined effects of future environmental change may result in substantial declines in environmental suitability for Mexican bats even under optimistic scenarios. This study highlights the vulnerability of megadiverse regions and an indicator taxon to human disturbance. The consideration of combined threats can make an important difference in how we react to changes to conserve our biodiversity as they pose different challenges.

Quantifying full phenological event distributions reveals simultaneous advances, temporal stability and delays in spring and autumn migration timing in long-distance migratory birds.

Abstract: Phenological changes in key seasonally expressed life-history traits occurring across periods of climatic and environmental change can cause temporal mismatches between interacting species, and thereby impact population and community dynamics. However, studies quantifying long-term phenological changes have commonly only measured variation occurring in spring, measured as the first or mean dates on which focal traits or events were observed. Few studies have considered seasonally paired events spanning spring and autumn or tested the key assumption that single convenient metrics accurately capture entire event distributions. We used 60 years (1955–2014) of daily bird migration census data from Fair Isle, Scotland, to comprehensively quantify the degree to which the full distributions of spring and autumn migration timing of 13 species of long-distance migratory bird changed across a period of substantial climatic and environmental change. In most species, mean spring and autumn migration dates changed little. However, the early migration phase (≤10th percentile date) commonly got earlier, while the late migration phase (≥90th percentile date) commonly got later. Consequently, species' total migration durations typically lengthened across years. Spring and autumn migration phenologies were not consistently correlated within or between years within species and hence were not tightly coupled. Furthermore, different metrics quantifying different aspects of migration phenology within seasons were not strongly cross-correlated, meaning that no single metric adequately described the full pattern of phenological change. These analyses therefore reveal complex patterns of simultaneous advancement, temporal stability and delay in spring and autumn migration phenologies, altering species' life-history structures. Additionally, they demonstrate that this complexity is only revealed if multiple metrics encompassing entire seasonal event distributions, rather than single metrics, are used to quantify phenological change. Existing evidence of long-term phenological changes detected using only one or two metrics should consequently be interpreted cautiously because divergent changes occurring simultaneously could potentially have remained undetected.