Conference Agenda

Wildlife damage to human property can lead to significant economic and emotional losses, opposition towards wildlife conservation, and even direct persecution of conflict-prone species. In this presentation, we evaluate multiple natural and anthropogenic drivers of human–wildlife conflicts as a means to find science-based and effective solutions that foster coexistence. We use the case study of brown bear (Ursus arctos) damages to human properties in Europe at multiple spatial scales to illustrate how compensation programs, landscape features, and forest productivity can influence the occurrence of damages at different temporal and spatial scales. At the continental scale, our findings emphasize the crucial role of proactive and preventive measures in reducing damage occurrence while highlighting that socio-cultural factors can heavily influence management policies and hinder conflict mitigation efforts. At the local scale, we deepen into the ecological drivers of conflicts. The results of our analyses show how natural resource pulses can percolate through food webs and impact human-wildlife coexistence, especially in areas where both the broader landscape context and household conditions favor damage occurrence. We will provide clear recommendations for reducing bear damages in the area and also offer a practical approach applicable in other places and to other species.

Carnivores have suffered the biggest range contraction among all biodiversity and are particularly vulnerable to habitat loss and fragmentation. They also suffer from conflict with humans over limited space and resources. Here, I will explain where the priority areas for the conservation of carnivores are globally and how expected agricultural and urban expansion will affect them. I will also describe how effective carnivores are as surrogates for 23,110 species of amphibians, birds, mammals and reptiles and 867 terrestrial ecoregions. I will then introduce which areas are at highest risk of human-carnivore conflicts in sub-Saharan Africa and what are the economic costs for humans to live alongside large carnivores. Finally, I will introduce how digital data (e.g., online news) and methods can be used to provide novel insights on opportunities for coexistence between humans and carnivores.

The wolf (Canis lupus) is highly successful at recolonizing its now human-dominated former ranges in Europe and N-America. Over the centuries while the wolf was absent, humans have transformed ecosystems to a large extent. This includes changes to (meso)carnivore communities, wolves themselves (genetics, behavior), woody plant communities and the playing field for predator-prey interactions (landscape structure). We argue that the recognition of the novelty of human-modified ecosystems logically leads to novel pathways of how wolves can influence ecosystem functioning. Thus far, the ecological impacts of wolves have largely been predicted based on the documented effects they have in well-preserved systems with low human impact. However, wolves in human-modified ecosystems will engage in an array of novel interactions and potential novel trophic cascades that do not occur in more natural ecosystems with lower human impact. A promising direction for future studies is exploring what novel interactions establish and under what conditions wolves can exert their ecosystem impacts in the human-modified ecosystems. This knowledge could guide us to act to improve conditions to enable wolves to exert their ecosystem impacts again. These novel interactions may be the true ecological and societal value of having wolves returning to human-modified landscapes.

For the last 100 years, trophic system ecology has depicted food webs that are devoid of humans. In the 21st century, it is abundantly clear that humans impact trophic systems in a diversity of ways via top-down and bottom-up pathways. When humans behave as predators, for instance, they sit above trophic systems where they are capable of turning even apex predators into prey. However, while the direct effects of humans on animal populations have been widely investigated, the indirect effects have only been assessed via emergent research. Thus, while it is widely understood that humans have unparalleled ability to reduce animal populations via lethal pressures, it is not yet clear how humans might induce defences in animals that carry fitness costs with subsequent demographic consequences. This talk explores these fundamental knowledge gaps by demonstrating how humans may shape animal populations in direct and indirect ways. It also articulates how these lethal pressures can be ameliorated to restore biodiversity. Providing that conservation interventions are successful at scale then, recovering biodiversity and human population growth may increase human-wildlife conflict. Thus, the talk concludes by discussing how the positionality of humans within trophic systems is essential to effective management for coexistence.

Human-induced mortality and disturbance of wildlife can be studied in a predator-prey framework. Predation affects the demography and behavior of animals, which trade off foraging efficiency and vigilance against predation risk. Mortality rates of large carnivores, like bears and wolves, are largely driven by people, which also influence their behavior. We have studied how bears of different European populations react to human activities at various spatial and temporal scales. Bears generally select for rugged terrain away from human settlements, relying on dense vegetation when they are closer to people. Bears become more nocturnal when and where there is more human activity. Overall, we have found a consistent pattern of human avoidance by bears, yet this pattern seems to be adapted to the human-modified landscapes that bears inhabit. The behavioral adaptations of large carnivores to human-induced risk and disturbance has effects in the short term (e.g., in habitat use) and, potentially, also regarding their evolution and ecological functionality. Behavioral and ecological issues, not only mere demographic trends, should matter for the management of large carnivores and human activities, to favor the role of such species in the ecosystem and to minimize negative effects of coexisting with people in human-dominated landscapes.

Human-carnivore conflict is a major conservation challenge that drives declines of large carnivore populations and impacts human livelihoods and major industries. Carnivores and other wildlife spend considerable time outside of protected areas, and climate change is contributing to increasing overlap between people and carnivores. Yet rarely are ecological and animal behavior data integrated with social and attitudinal information describing people’s perceptions of risks and benefits from carnivores, despite the importance of these societal factors for carnivore conservation. Elevating local community perspectives and histories and incorporating them with data on ecology and animal behavior can help us to understand how people and carnivores may successfully share landscapes over the long term despite expanding human development and activity. Here, we discuss case studies on human-carnivore interactions and carnivore movement in Nakuru, Kenya and California, USA, and explore how an intersectional lens can complement applied science for more holistic and socially just conservation outcomes.