Response: Commentary: Anthropogenic disturbances jeopardize biodiversity conservation within tropical rainforest reserves

Commentary: Anthropogenic disturbances jeopardize biodiversity conservation within tropical rainforest reserves

Anthropogenic disturbances infiltrate forest fragments.

In the years after Edward O. Wilson and Robert MacArthur’s seminal book, The Theory of Island Biogeography (1), which laid the foundations for understanding species diversity and extinction rates in isolated habitats, was published in 1967, a flurry of papers erupted on the effect of fragmentation in tropical rainforests. The big question at that time was whether it would be more advisable to p...

Past Human Disturbance Effects upon Biodiversity are Greatest in the Canopy; A Case Study on Rainforest Butterflies

A key part of tropical forest spatial complexity is the vertical stratification of biodiversity, with widely differing communities found in higher rainforest strata compared to terrestrial levels. Despite this, our understanding of how human disturbance may differentially affect biodiversity across vertical strata of tropical forests has been slow to develop. For the first time, how the pattern...

Economic benefits of biodiversity exceed costs of conservation at an African rainforest reserve.

Economic research on biodiversity conservation has focused on the costs of conservation reserves and the benefits of intact ecosystems; however, no study has simultaneously considered the costs and benefits of species diversity, a fundamental component of biodiversity. We quantified the costs and benefits of avian biodiversity at a rainforest reserve in Uganda through a combination of economic ...

How much potential biodiversity and conservation value can a regenerating rainforest provide? A ‘best-case scenario’ approach from the Peruvian Amazon

The structure and underlying functions of the majority of the world’s tropical forests have been disrupted by human impacts, but the potential biodiversity and conservation value of regenerating forests is still debated. One review suggests that on average, regenerating tropical forests hold 57% (±2.6%) of primary forest species richness, raising doubt about a viable second chance to conserve b...