BUSCADOR RECOLECTA

Protected areas are supposed to maintain viable populations of plant and animaltaxa and shield them from anthropogenic threats, but this role is increasingly underscrutiny. Here, we document the alarming extinction of a small falcon, the Eurasianhobby Falco subbuteo,inDo~nana National Park, an iconic protected arearenowned for its rich predator community. Hobbies were originally abundant at50–60 pairs and acted as unique specialist hunters of swifts and dragonies. Thisdiet implies a unique niche within the raptor assemblage and frequent ranging overagricultural areas surrounding the park. The high density of other raptors likelyconstrained habitat availability. Predation was the main cause of breeding failure,and hatching and breeding success were always low, especially in drought years,and declined progressively through time. The extinction occurred rapidly after2000 with several clues suggesting the synergistic contribution of prey depletion,farmland intensication, chemical contamination, predation and climate warming.Lack of detailed monitoring prevented a clear assessment of the relative role ofthese factors, but most of them seemed traceable to farming practices and climatechange, i.e. large-scale drivers generated outside the Park. The documented extinc-tion is alarming because this species is not particularly exigent, it may imply wide-spread declines of other species, and because this loss adds to the imminent localextinction of another raptor with profoundly different requirements, suggestingmounting, broad-level pressures affecting the whole ecosystem. This unforseen,rapid extinction in a Park that dedicates much effort to raptor management offersbroad-scale reections. Climate change and growing anthropogenic pressures willmake unexpected species losses increasingly common in protected areas, whichwill face growing difculties in identifying decline-drivers and in performing theirprotective task. Increased knowledge, quality monitoring and rapid managementaction will be needed for protected areas to deliver their role, but this will requireincreased funding., Peer reviewed

Large, long-lived species with slow life histories and protracted pre-breeding stages are particularly susceptible to declines and extinction, often for unknown causes. Here, we show how demographic modeling of a medium-sized raptor, the Red Kite Milvus milvus, can aid to refocus conservation research and attention on the most likely mechanisms driving its decline. Red Kites’ survival and reproduction increased through three sequential stages for 1–2, 3–6, and 7–30 yr of age, mainly corresponding to individuals that are dispersing, attempting to gain a territory, and breeding. As typical of long-lived species, elasticities were highest for adult (≥7 yr old) survival, but this was high, with little scope for improvement. Instead, the declines were driven by an extremely low survival of pre-adults in their first years of life, which weakened the whole demographic system by nullifying the offspring contribution of adults and curtailing their replacement by recruits. For example, 27 pairs were necessary to generate a single prime age adult. Simulation of management scenarios suggested that the decline could be halted most parsimoniously by increasing pre-adult survival to the mean levels recorded for other areas, while only the synergistic, simultaneous improvement of breeding success, adult and pre-adult survival could generate a recovery. We propose three actions to attain such goals through selective supplementary feeding of both breeding and non-breeding individuals, and through mortality improvement by GPS remote-sensing devices employed as surveillance monitoring tools. Our results show how improving demographic models by using real, local vital rates rather than “best guess” vital rates can dramatically improve model realism by refocusing attention on the actual stages and mortality causes in need of manipulation, thus building precious time and resources for conservation management. These results also highlight the frequent key role of pre-adult survival for the management of long-lived species, coherent with the idea of demographic systems as integrated chains only as strong as their weakest link., This study was funded by the Foundation Jaime González-Gordon and by the research projects 1602/2015 of the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Food and the Environment (Autonomous Organism of National Parks), PGC2018-095860-B-I00 of the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities with Feder Funds, and P18-FR-4239 of the Andalucía Autonomous Region (Consejería de Economía, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad).

The data are organized into seven Excel files on how black kites negotiate wind conditions when they: depart for migration (depart for migration.xlsx), travel and compensate for lateral drift (drift.xlsx), travel and negotiate axial winds (forward.xlsx), stop for a staging stop over (stop for stopover.xlsx), retake their migratory journey after a stopover (start from stopover). Two further Excel files examine how wind negotiation improves within the individual (improvements.xlsx) and is subject to mortality selection (survival & slope.xlsx)., This dataset incorporates data on wind negotiation and response to drift by migratory black kites., Part of the study was funded by Natural Research Ltd and research projects CGL2008-01781 (F.S.), CGL2011-28103 (F.S.), CGL2012-32544 (J.B.) and PGC2018-095860-B-I00 (F.S.) of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation/Economy and Competitiveness and FEDER funds, 511/2012 (J.B.) of the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Food and the Environment (Autonomous Organism of National Parks), JA-58 (F.S.) of the Consejería de Medio Ambiente de la Junta de Andalucía and by the Excellence Projects RNM 1790 (F.S.), RNM 3822 (F.S.), RNM 7307 (F.S.) and P18-FR-4239 (F.S.) of the Junta de Andalucía. J.M.B was supported by Generalitat Valenciana (CIDEGENT/2020/030)., File List: Depart for migration.xls, Depart for stopover.xls, Drift.xls Forward.xls, Improvements.xls, Stop at stopover.xls, Survival & slope.xls., Peer reviewed

Degradation of natural ecosystems increases the risk of infections in wildlife due to microbiota dysbiosis. However, little is known about its influence on the development of fungal communities in predators and facultative avian scavengers. We evaluated the incidence of oral disease in wild nestling black kites (Milvus migrans) under contrasting environmental degradation conditions, and explored their oral fungal patterns using molecular methods and multivariate analysis. Oral lesions were found in 36.8% of the 38 nestlings examined in an anthropogenically altered habitat (southeastern Madrid, Spain), but in none of the 105 nestlings examined in a well-conserved natural area (Doñana National Park, Spain). In a subsample of 48 black kites, the composition of the oral fungal community differed among symptomatic nestlings from Madrid (SM) and asymptomatic nestlings from Madrid (AM) and Doñana (AD). Opportunistic fungal pathogens (e.g., Fusarium incarnatum-equiseti species complex, Mucor spp., Rhizopus oryzae) were more prevalent in SM and AM than in AD. Hierarchical clustering and principal component analyses revealed that fungal patterns were distinct between both study areas, and that anthropogenic and natural environmental factors had a greater impact on them than oral disease. Fungal signatures associated with anthropogenic and natural stresses harbored some taxa that could be used to flag oral infection (F. incarnatum-equiseti species complex and Alternaria), indicate environmental degradation (Alternaria) or provide protective benefits in degraded environments (Trichoderma, Epicoccum nigrum and Sordaria). Co-occurrence associations between potentially beneficial and pathogenic fungi were typical of AM and AD, hinting at a possible role in host health. This study shows that early-life exposure to highly degraded environments induces a shift towards a higher prevalence of pathogenic species in the oral cavity of black kites, favoring oral disease. Furthermore, our findings suggest potential ecological applications of the monitoring of oral mycobiome as a bioindication of oral disease and environmental degradation., This work was supported by projects CGL2009-12753-C02-01/BOS, CGL2010-15726 and PGC2018-095860-B-I00 of the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, and FEDER funds and P18-FR-4239 of the Junta de Andalucía (Consejería de Conocimiento, Investigación y Universidad)., Peer reviewed

The data are organized into 10 spreadsheets within a single Excel file on the impact of drought on: prey availability, nestlings' provisioning rates, probability of breeding, clutch size, hatching success, brood reduction, predation rate, number of young fledged per breeding pair, number of young fledged per territorial pair, body condition, body size., Part of the study was funded by Foundation Jaime González-Gordon and by the research projects 1602/2015 of the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Food and the Environment (Autonomous Organism of National Parks), PGC2018-095860-B-I00 of the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities with Feder Funds, and P18-FR-4239 of the Andalucía Autonomous Region (Consejería de Economía, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad)., Peer reviewed

Climate change is increasing the frequency of extreme events, such as droughts or hurricanes, with substantial impacts on human and wildlife communities. Extreme events can affect individuals through two pathways: by altering the fitness of adults encountering a current extreme, and by affecting the development of individuals born during a natal extreme, a largely overlooked process. Here, we show that the impact of natal drought on an avian predator overrode the effect of current drought for decades, so that individuals born during drought were disadvantaged throughout life. Incorporation of natal effects caused a 40% decline in forecasted population size and a 21% shortening of time to extinction. These results imply that climate change may erode populations more quickly and severely than currently appreciated, suggesting the urgency to incorporate “penalties” for natal legacies in the analytical toolkit of impact forecasts. Similar double impacts may apply to other drivers of global change., Logistic and technical support was provided by ICTS-RBD-CSIC, Ministry of Science and Innovation and co-financed by FEDER Funds. This study was funded by the Foundation Jaime González-Gordon and by the research projects 1602/2015 (F.S.) of the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Food and the Environment (Autonomous Organism of National Parks), PGC2018-095860-B-I00 (F.S.) of the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities with Feder Funds, and P18-FR-4239 (F.S.) of the Andalucía Autonomous Region (Consejería de Economía, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad).

Each year, billions of flying and swimming migrants negotiate the challenging displacement imposed by travelling through a flowing medium. However, little is known about how the ability to cope with drift improves through life and what mechanisms drive its development. We examined 3,140 days of migration by 90 GPS-tagged raptorial black kites (Milvus migrans) aged 1-27 years to show that the ability to compensate for lateral drift develops gradually through many more years than previously appreciated. Drift negotiation was under strong selective pressure, with inferior navigators subject to increased mortality. This progressively selected for adults able to compensate for current cross flows and for previously accumulated drift in a flexible, context-dependent and risk-dependent manner. Displacements accumulated en route carried over to shape the wintering distribution of the population. For many migrants, migratory journeys by younger individuals represent concentrated episodes of trait selection that shape adult populations and mediate their adaptation to climate change., Peer reviewed