Conservation in tropical forests: too fast, too furious? Improving legacy, collaboration, and ethical local participation in parrot species monitoring

座舱国是牙买加中西部高地上一个茂密的山地雨林。它的地形非常难以接近，几个世纪以来，它保护了黑人在跨大西洋奴隶贸易中不被英国人（再次）捕获。“绿色盔甲”还保护着牙买加本土的许多稀有鸟类、两栖动物和蝙蝠物种，其中许多物种只能在驾驶舱国家找到。交通不便严重影响了牙买加森林保护的出现。大片的森林仍然是未知的；厚厚的树冠覆盖使得卫星图像变得多余。密集、不平坦、无法通航的地形也使现代保护所依赖的其他技术变得无用。无人机几乎没有飞行路径，没有互联网可以远程上传，GPS追踪器很难安装，因为鸟巢和繁殖地基本上是未知的，而且往往在繁殖季节之间（甚至在繁殖季节期间）被遗弃，相机陷阱效果甚微，因为物种很小，而且/或很难被发现。为数不多的西方研究人员被吸引到该地区寻找稀有鸟类或青蛙，他们通常进行独立的项目，这些项目必须手工完成，因此难度很大；许多物种被宣布为濒危物种，并且不再返回。这样的研究没有利用秘密传统村庄掌握的当地知识，他们的专业知识为这些物种在其他难以进入的景观中的分布提供了关键线索。它还省略了当地非政府组织之前进行的调查，这些调查能够提供拼凑的线索，表明人口趋势、新出现的威胁和环境变化。它也不涉及承担综合这些全球评估和呼吁将物种保护纳入国家政策的任务的国家部门，因为他们资金不足，因此他们不被信任。我的博士研究重新定义了传统知识——现在在主流保护中受到追捧——不是广泛或共同的，而是排他性的、等级的、性别活动的结果。这些弄脏衣服、弄脏靴子、弄硬双手的行为也造成了文化差异。来自较富裕或较大家庭的男子，积累了较多的资源，在家庭分工中几乎没有责任，使他们有时间和手段从事传统习俗；那些来自依赖工资劳动力的较小/较贫穷家庭的人参加文化活动的能力较差。具有讽刺意味的是，资助机构经常要求社区参与，这进一步使社区垂直化，因为传统从业者成为当地专家、研究助理和项目顾问，而保护结果限制了其他人未经批准的进入。这个协会的目的有三个。第一个是在学术界传播我的博士研究结果，在学术界，越来越多的人认为地方参与保护研究的重要性，但对其社会、政治和经济后果的关注却很少。这包括一个专题论文的提议，详细介绍了整个座舱国家森林中最后一个幸存的Maroon村不到1%的人口所保持的不稳定和脆弱的传统。座舱国家森林占牙买加陆地面积的10%以上，并支持其90%以上的特有陆生物种。第二是继续在与Maroon社区共同制作的专门网站（www.countermappingcockpit.com）上提供开放获取的数据（地图、环境数据、物种数量数据）和传统知识的记录（使用博客、照片、视频）。第三是研究不同的（低技术和高科技）方法，使利益相关者团体更多、更有道德地参与到对现在濒临灭绝的黑嘴鹦鹉的监测中，并在保护网络中实施研究结果。

Cockpit Country is a dense, hilly rainforest in the uplands of west-central Jamaica. So inaccessible is its terrain that for centuries it protected the Maroons from (re)capture by the British during the Transatlantic slave trade. The "green armour" also protects the many rare bird, amphibian, and bat species native to Jamaica, many of which can only be found in Cockpit Country. The inaccessibility has heavily impacted the emergence of forest conservation in Jamaica. Large swathes of the forest remain uncharted; satellite imagery is made redundant by the heavy blanket of canopy cover. The dense, uneven, unnavigable terrain also renders useless other technologies upon which modern conservation relies. There is little flight path available for drones, there is no internet available for remote uploads, GPS trackers are difficult to install because nests and breeding grounds are largely unknown and often abandoned between - even during - breeding seasons, and camera traps yield little because the species are small and/or poorly detectable. The few Western researchers drawn to the region in search of rare birds or frogs typically undertake standalone projects that are necessarily manual and, consequently, difficult; many declare species as threatened and do not return. Such research makes no use of local knowledge held by clandestine traditional villages, whose expertise provides critical clues for the distribution of these species across an otherwise impenetrable landscape. It also omits prior investigations undertaken by local NGOs, able to make available a patchwork of clues indicating population trends, emerging threats, and environmental shifts. It also does not involve the state departments who inherit the task of synthesising these global assessments and calls for increased species protection into national policy, for which they are underfunded and because of which they are untrusted. My doctoral research reframed traditional knowledge - now sought-after in mainstream conservation - not as widespread or communal, but as the result of exclusive, hierarchical, gendered activities. The very actions that soil clothes, muddy boots, and harden hands also create cultural divisions. Males from wealthier or larger households, with greater accumulated resources, have little responsibility within household division of labour, affording them the time and means to engage in traditional practices; those from smaller/poorer households reliant on wage labour are less able to access cultural activities. Ironically, the community participation often demanded by funding bodies, further verticalizes communities, as traditional practitioners become local experts, research assistants, and project consultants, while conservation outcomes restrict unsanctioned access by everyone else. The aims of this fellowship are threefold. The first is to disseminate the findings of my PhD across academic circles, where there is a growing consensus on the importance of local participation in conservation research, with scant attention paid to its social, political, and economic consequences. This includes the proposal of a monograph that details the precarious and fragile traditions maintained by fewer than 1% of the population of the last remaining Maroon village in the entire Cockpit Country forest - a region encompassing more than 10% of Jamaica's landmass and supporting over 90% of its endemic terrestrial species. The second is to continue to provide open-access data (maps, environmental data, species population data) and documentation of traditional knowledge (using blogs, photographs, video) on a dedicated website co-produced with the Maroon community (www.countermappingcockpit.com). The third is to research different (low and high tech) methodologies that enable greater, more ethical participation by stakeholder groups into the monitoring of the now-Endangered black-billed parrot and operationalise findings across conservation networks.