I think one of the great challenges for modern conservation is finding ways of getting good outcomes for biodiversity in environments that would traditionally be considered to be human-dominated. Think, for example, about the urban or agricultural landscapes that make up the vast majority of land cover in many countries. And then imagine if we… Continue reading Two new papers on Novel ecosystems and Biodiversity Sensitive Urban Design
It is common for ecologists to classify animals into groups based on habitat preferences - think, for example, of woodland birds or tropical reef fish. These groupings make intuitive sense and are useful for considering the broader implications of habitat loss and management. However, what happens if different ecologists classify species differently? Work done by… Continue reading Classifying animals into ecologically-meaningful groups
Our new book chapter, Rapid prototyping for decision structuring, is now available! It describes a simple and effective process for facilitating conservation decisions using a structured decision making approach. Structured decision making is a process in which a decision is systematically broken down into individual decision components that can be separately explored and analysed in… Continue reading Our new rapid prototyping book chapter
Monday, 6th February 2017 9am - 5pm University of Melbourne A one-day workshop for early-mid career scientists in conservation and environmental research areas, who are interested in public engagement for practical and/or philosophical reasons. RSVP to Fiona Fidler (fidlerfm@unimelb.edu.au) What are the bounds of being an ‘objective’ scientist, and how will I know if I… Continue reading Workshop Invitation – The role of scientists in public debate and advocacy
We have funding for a PhD student to investigate the role of targeted messaging and framing for improving threatened species conservation. A tax-free stipend of approximately $35,000/yr for 3 years is provided by RMIT University and the National Environmental Science Programme’s Threatened Species Recovery Hub. Details on the project, and how to apply, are available… Continue reading PhD Opportunity – Improved messaging for threatened species conservation
Late last year, I published (in collaboration with colleagues from RMIT and The University of Melbourne) an article in Conservation Letters, which we hope will open up a little more space for conservation scientists and ecologists to engage in public debates without the fear of being labelled an advocate and, by association, having their scientific… Continue reading Beyond Advocacy – a new take on the advocacy debate
Earlier this year, we published a paper in Global Ecology and Biogeography that showed that Australian cities are hotspots for threatened species. In a national analysis, we found that 30% of Australia's threatened species have distributions that include cities, all Australian cities are covered by the mapped distributions of threatened species and that some threatened… Continue reading Cities are biodiversity hotspots – now online for kids
This post is about research recently featured in The Age that promotes an alternative approach to urban development in Melbourne. This post also appears on RMIT's Interdisciplinary Conservation Science Research Group's blog. https://youtu.be/G3ywg5psAUI The case for an alternative Current approaches to urban development in Melbourne focus on low-density urban sprawl and high-density high-rise. In middle-ring… Continue reading Sustainable, biodiverse mid-rise development for Fishermans Bend
This blog post is about an upcoming paper in Conservation Biology. It is now widely accepted that many species are not perfectly detectable during an ecological survey. This means that, sometimes, a species that is present at a site will not be detected by an observer (or observers) during a survey of that site. The… Continue reading Detectability, threatened species and environmental impact assessments
This afternoon, on my way home from a friend’s in Malmsbury, I decided to stop in Sunbury to have a look at one of Melbourne’s best native grasslands. I first saw this grassland when I started my PhD in 2005. But it’s been a few years since I’ve seen it at this time of the… Continue reading Splendour in the grass
Georgia Garrard 