New Paper: Predicting the Distribution of Commercially Important Invertebrate Stocks under Future Climate

A new paper involving Environment Institute members Bayden Russell, Sean Connell, Camille Mellin (also Australian Institute of Marine Science), Barry Brook, Owen Burnell and Damien Fordham has recently been published in the journal PLOS One.

The journal titled ‘Predicting the Distribution of Commercially Important Invertebrate Stocks under Future Climate’ projected the future distribution and numbers of two commercially harvested abalone species (blacklip abalone, Haliotis rubra and greenlip abalone, H. laevigata) inhabiting coastal South Australia, using multiple species distribution models (SDM) and for decadal time slices through to 2100.The projections are based on two contrasting global greenhouse gas emissions scenarios. The results provide a practical first approximation of the potential impact of climate-induced change on the two species of marine invertebrates in the same fishery.

Read the paper to find out more about these results.

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New Paper: Climate change and the cockatoo

Berton Harris

A new paper titled ‘Managing the long-term persistence of a rare cockatoo under climate change‘ investigates using combined population and bioclimatic models to estimate the future effects of climate change on the viability of a cockatoo population. Their research revealed that unmitigated climate change is likely to be a substantial threat to the cockatoo.

The paper involves Environment Institute members Berton Harris, Damien Fordham, David Paton, Michael Stead, Michael Watts and Barry Brook as well as Patricia Mooney (Department of Environment and Heritage), Lynn Pedler (Department of Environment and Heritage), Miguel Araújo (National Museum of Natural Sciences) and Reşit Akçakaya (Stony Brook University). The paper was published in the Journal of Applied Ecology

Download the paper to read about their findings

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New Paper: Long-term breeding phenology shift in royal penguins

A new paper involving Environment Institute members Corey Bradshaw, Barry Brook and Damien Fordham as well as Mark Hindell (University of Tasmania), Knowles Kerry (Australian Antarctic Division), Cindy Hull (University of Tasmania) and Clive McMahon (University of Tasmania and Charles Darwin University) has recently been published in the journal Ecology and Evolution.

The paper titled ‘Long-term breeding phenology shift in royal penguins’ looks at the breeding life cycle of the royal penguin and investigates if it is being influenced by seasonal and inter annual variations in climate. The findings suggest that the unifying factor underpinning phenological trends in eastern Antarctica is resource availability.

Download the paper to find out more about this fascinating research.

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New Paper – Booming during a bust: Asynchronous population responses of arid zone lizards to climatic variables

A new paper written by Environment Institute members, Dr John Read, Professor Barry Brook and Dr Damien Fordham as well as Kelli-Jo Kovac from the Environment Section, BHP Billiton Olympic Dam, has been made available online and will soon be published in the Journal Acta Oecologica.

The paper titled ‘Booming during a bust: Asynchronous population responses of arid zone lizards to climatic variables’ explores the productivity of arid environments and the reproductive success of vertebrates in these systems. Data from their 15 year study at an Australian arid zone site reveals asynchronous demographic responses to rainfall and other climatic variables among different lizard species.

Read and dowload the paper to find out what the researchers discovered by analysing a 15-year multi-species capture-mark-recapture dataset.

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