Quantitative assessment of supplementary feeding as an adaptive conservation management strategy for red-billed choughs.

成功地保护野生动物种群需要政府和非政府机构制定有效的管理政策，从而维护野生动物的内在、文化和经济利益。一个关键的范例是适应性管理，其中i）对人口变化的生态和人口驱动因素的科学理解用于规划和实施管理; ii）对人口生态，人口和动态的影响进行量化; iii）由此产生的证据用于规划后续管理。然而，这种适应性管理很少颁布，尤其是因为高质量的数据量化的短期和长期的影响，初步管理很少收集或严格分析，侵蚀的证据基础，为未来policy.This项目提供了一个优秀的多学科的培训机会，博士生开发一个示范性的适应性管理模式，为英国最濒危的鸟类之一，红嘴山鸦。学生将严格评估一个关键的管理干预，补充喂养，在苏格兰雄鸦人口的主要保护问题应用的影响。他们将与参与研究、政策和运营的政府保护机构工作人员以及利益相关者和学者合作，利用所得证据来决定未来的保护政策。因此，该项目将培训一名新的科学家，以推动科学与政策的融合，提高社会通过适应性管理保护珍贵野生动物种群的能力。然而，尽管脊椎动物种群动态通常受到亚成体和成体存活率低的限制，但补充喂养制度通常侧重于增加繁殖成功率。尽管它作为一个关键的管理工具的潜力，很少有实验或管理干预措施喂养亚成体，或评估对亚成体生存的短期影响。此外，这种喂养可能会通过改变亚成体传播、首次繁殖或随后繁殖的年龄产生深远的长期影响。然而，没有研究量化了这种影响，或因此评估了亚成体补充喂养对种群增长率的总体影响。苏格兰剩下的山鸦种群仅限于艾莱岛和科隆赛岛，由于生态旅游、文化意义和与低强度畜牧业的联系，它们具有重大的保护问题和社会经济价值。苏格兰自然遗产（SNH），苏格兰的法定保护机构，有义务采取适当的管理action.Analyses高质量的人口数据，1983-2009年表明，山鸦人口规模的变化在很大程度上反映了亚成体生存的变化，非常高的亚成体死亡率在2007-2009年威胁到人口的生存能力。因此，SNH资助了一个亚成年山鸦补充喂养方案和相关的人口监测。在2010年7月至2018年4月期间，Islay上的亚成体亚群每天都由苏格兰Chough研究小组（SCSG）喂养。收集了详细的环重新定位和巢穴监测数据，以便量化进食和未进食个体的生存、扩散和繁殖。博士生将使用这个真正显着的多年数据集，全面评估亚成体补充喂养对人口统计学和种群增长率的影响。使用前-中-控制-影响（BDCI）分析涵盖1983-2019年。他们将与SNH和SCSG（CASE和项目合作伙伴）合作，利用他们的研究结果，在苏格兰农村发展计划制定的更广泛的栖息地管理背景下决定未来的喂养政策。因此，他们将开展出色的科学研究，量化一种新形式的补充喂养的效果，并直接影响英国政府负责的珍稀鸟类保护政策和实践。

Successful conservation of wildlife populations requires effective management policies to be enacted by government and non-government agencies, thereby maintaining wildlife's intrinsic, cultural and economic benefits. One key paradigm is adaptive management, where i) scientific understanding of ecological and demographic drivers of population change is used to plan and implement management; ii) impacts on population ecology, demography and dynamics are quantified; iii) resulting evidence is used to plan subsequent management. However, such adaptive management is rarely enacted, not least because high-quality data quantifying short-term and longer-term impacts of initial management are rarely collected or rigorously analysed, eroding the evidence-base for future policy.This project provides an outstanding multidisciplinary training opportunity for a PhD student to develop an exemplary adaptive management model for one of the UK's most endangered birds, the red-billed chough. The student will rigorously evaluate effects of a key management intervention, supplementary feeding, applied in a Scottish chough population of major conservation concern. They will work alongside government conservation agency staff involved in research, policy and operation, and stakeholders and academics, to use resulting evidence to decide future conservation policy. The project will thereby train a new scientist to drive science-policy convergence, advancing society's ability to conserve valued wildlife populations through adaptive management.Provision of supplementary food is a key management tool for food-limited target populations. However, althoughvertebrate population dynamics are commonly constrained by low sub-adult and adult survival, supplementary feeding regimes typically focus instead on increasing breeding success. Despite its potential as a key management tool, few experimental or management interventions have fed sub-adults, or evaluated short-term effects on sub-adult survival. Further, such feeding could have profound longer-term effects by altering sub-adult dispersal, age at first breeding or subsequent reproduction. However, no studies have quantified such effects or hence evaluated overall effects ofsupplementary feeding of sub-adults on population growth rate. Scotland's remaining chough population is limited to Islay and Colonsay and is of major conservation concern and socioeconomicvalue due to eco-tourism, cultural significance and links to low-intensity pastoral agriculture. Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH), Scotland's statutory conservation agency, is obliged to undertake appropriate management action.Analyses of high-quality demographic data for 1983-2009 showed that variation in chough population size largely reflects variation in sub-adult survival, and very high sub-adult mortality during 2007-2009 threatened population viability. SNH therefore funded a programme of supplementary feeding of sub-adult choughs and associated demographic monitoring. A subset of sub-adults on Islay were/will be fed daily during July-April 2010-2018, by Scottish Chough Study Group (SCSG). Detailed ring resighting and nest monitoring data have been collected to allow survival, dispersal and reproduction of fed and unfed individuals to be quantified.The PhD student will use this truly remarkable multi-year dataset to comprehensively assess effects of supplementary feeding of sub-adults on demography and population growth rate using Before-During-Control-Impact (BDCI) analyses encompassing 1983-2019. They will work with SNH and SCSG (CASE and project partners) to use their results to decide future feeding policy in the wider context of habitat management enacted by the Scottish Rural Development Programme. They will thereby undertake excellent science to quantify effects of a novel form of supplementary feeding, and directly influence conservation policy and practice for a rare bird for which UK governments are responsible.