Polar Ecology and Health

Unique arctic tundra areas are squeezed by forest and economic expansion. “Which areas should be protected now to enable tundra biodiversity and related ecosystem services, including permafrost protection, to survive the future warming peak?” and “How can conservation planning help resolve potential land-use conflicts and management decisions?” will be answered by SQUEEZE. We will develop the interactive decision-support tool TundraProtect allowing for the systematic conservation planning of a sustainable and acceptable protected tundra area network at the circum-Arctic scale. TundraProtect will be informed by results from re-analyses, data-synthesis and modelling approaches implemented by the interdisciplinary SQUEEZE team integrating knowledge from stakeholders and Indigenous rights holders, which is a transdisciplinary component in SQUEEZE. Taking slow ecosystem responses to climate change into account when assessing conservation opportunities represents a new conceptual framework in conservation planning. Even more, for the first time, management of reindeer herbivory and fire will be systematically assessed for their potential to temporarily halt tundra loss. Our innovative science communication design will make use of our existing communication channels between science and stake/rights holders and will involve the development of an e-learning module for the WWF academy as well as teacher training.

Major Objective:

Which areas should be protected now to enable tundra biodiversity and related ecosystem services, including permafrost protection, to survive the future warming peak?” and “How can conservation planning help resolve potential land-use conflicts and management decisions?” will be addressed by the SQUEEZE project.

Project website: https://app.netlify.com/sites/squeeze-project/overview

Project 1:

The current panzootic of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) has now spread worldwide except for Australia and New Zealand and has had unprecedented impacts on wild animal populations as well as devastating impacts on the poultry industry. The global spread amongst wild bird population is facilitated by long-distance migratory birds and notably arctic breeding waterfowl and shorebirds. Understanding the potential role of wild birds in introducing and spreading HPAI in Australia is an important aspect of preparedness and response planning for human health and industry, as well as for wildlife managers.

 In a project funded by Wildlife Health Australia, we developed an online platform to assess potential incursion risks by investigating migratory movements, bird aggregations, and species susceptibility.

https://hpairisk.deakin.edu.au

Project 2:

To elucidate current bird migration routes and changes to migration behaviour and site use in response to global change processes, and assess the incursion risk of diseases via Arctic breeding birds, we aim to use a combination of leg-flag sightings and geolocator tracks of migratory birds collected over the last decades, in combination with state-of-the-art modelling approaches. The leg-flag sightings and tracking data will be analysed to map and detect changes to migration timing, migration routes and breeding ground use, and to parameterise models allowing to assess potential virus transport under different climate-, habitat and socio-economic changes. Building an understanding of where birds go during migration, where they breed, and how these travelling itineraries have changed and will continue to change going into the future will be critically important to understanding disease risk and developing effective mitigation plans, as well as the continued conservation management of shorebirds. Outputs of this project will provide HPAI strategic information and inform policy development, while also supporting international obligations to the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species, migratory bird agreements, and international obligations to Ramsar wetlands.

Project led by: Marcel Klaassen (Deakin University, Australia), Simeon Lisovski (AWI), Sara Ryding (Deakin University)

Project website: https://www.nespmarinecoastal.edu.au/project/4-26/

Project funded by:

Predicting the capacity of migratory animals to adjust to environmental change is a key challenge in ecology. We developed a modeling framework to predict migrations of several shorebird species, using past (1960s), present (2010s), and potential future (2060) conditions, in one of the world’s most rapidly changing flyway—the East Asian-Australasian Flyway. By comparing model predictions with empirical tracks, we show how much migrations need to change and how the required changes differ markedly among species. Overall, larger species require more fundamental changes, such as using entirely different sites and routes, to maintain optimal strategies, whereas smaller species need less-profound adjustments. Our framework provides a powerful tool to identify required adaptations in migratory behavior due to multiple concurrent environmental changes.

Article: S. Lisovski, B.J. Hoye, J.R. Conklin, P.F. Battley, R.A. Fuller, K.B. Gosbell, M. Klaassen, C. Benjamin Lee, N.J. Murray, & S. Bauer.  Predicting resilience of migratory birds to environmental change, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 121 (19) e2311146121, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2311146121 (2024). 

The current highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 panzootic is having substantial impacts on wild birds and marine mammals. Following major and widespread outbreaks in South America, an incursion to Antarctica occurred late in the austral summer of 2023/2024 and was confined to the region of the Antarctic Peninsula. To infer potential underlying processes, we compiled H5N1 surveillance data from Antarctica and sub-Antarctic Islands prior to the first confirmed cases.

Article: Lisovski S, et al. Unexpected Delayed Incursion of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza H5N1 (Clade 2.3.4.4b) Into the Antarctic Region. Influenza Other Respir Viruses. 2024 Oct;18(10):e70010.https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/irv.70010