Bee Conservation Evidence for the effects of interventions [Hardcover]

This book is the first in a projected series by the Conservation Evidence Project 'building into a comprehensive summary of evidence on the effects of conservation interventions for all biodiversity throughout the world'. Quite a claim, and clearly one that will always be ongoing and need updating. The project was set up because the authors felt that conservation intervention has so often been on an ad hoc basis. A proper assessment of evidencc was needed to provide a rigorous baseline for all conservation interventions. In the interests of spreading the information as widely as possible, the project provides a website with a peer-reviewed open access journal and including this entire book. They invite contributions that detail any evidcnce, positive or negative, for an intervention in the name of conservation. As such it seems a most laudable project and this is its first booklength fruit.

The book runs to only 133 text pages but is divided into twelve chapters and a total of 68 sections. These detail the threats from developments, agricultural change (the one long chapter), pollution, transport, biological resources, fire, non-native and native species and positive measures of providing artificial nest sites, rearing wild bees and education. The authors have found a comprehcnsive list of detailed studies that genuinely demonstrate evidence of impact. Each study is examined in tum, and the book frequently states: ,..replicated control trials... show... , Most usefully, they raise the negative evidence too. Potential threats, problems or solutions that people think are important, or could make an impact, are dealt with briefly with the oft-repeated phrase We have captured no evidence for,.. . This surely will stimulate researchers to see whether there is any evidence for any of these issues, for example, connecting areas of natural or semi-natural habitat, re-planting forest, or reducing fertilizer run-off from fields. Almost inevitably l-