Climate, collaboration and collection Informing the new conservation - PDF document

13 th National Biodiversity Network Conference: Friday 15 th November 2013 Climate, collaboration and collection – Informing the new conservation agenda Presentation Outline Summary 10.15 Professor Ian Boyd, Chief Scientist Advisor at Defra Keynote address ‘ Biodiversity, habitats and Earth Observation: futures for Big data in the UK’ 10.45 Katie Winney, National Trust Biological recording in a changing world. Collecting data through to managing for change on National Trust land The National Trust owns nearly 250,000 ha of land and 1200 km of coastline in England, Wales and NI. Much of it is held inalienably and a relatively high proportion is designated for nature features. Of the environmental drivers of species decline, climate change is the key factor impacting on UK wildlife. Major landowners such as the National Trust have the potential to track and report changes in species and habitats over big temporal and spatial scales, and to provide large spaces for people and nature. Through examples we describe the use of in house and external expert biological surveyors, including Volunteers, to track environmental changes. The increasing usefulness of Citizen Science ‐ based projects, together with a plethora of innovative survey techniques means we can help connect people with nature, as well as conduct effective management of non ‐ native and native species. Large scale planning with partners (including our farming tenants) should make it easier for animals, plants and people to move through landscapes, and therefore cope better with environmental change. In the implementation of such landscape scale projects, it will be critical to design monitoring programmes that demonstrate whether or not the expected added values of going large scale have been realised. Citizen science based species recording has the potential to do this work. 11.05 Matt Davies, Greenspace Information Greater London (GiGL) Daylighting recent GiGL projects Matt is Operations Manager at Greenspace Information for Greater London CIC (GiGL) ‐ the capital’s environmental records centre. GiGL collate, manage and make available detailed information on London’s wildlife, parks, nature reserves, gardens and other open spaces. As members of the Association of Local Environmental Record Centres (ALERC) and the London and South East Record Centre group (LaSER), GiGL operate what might be called a ‘local biodiversity network’. The full breadth of GiGL work is astounding and in his presentation Matt will explore a few recent projects to showcase, or daylight, some geospatial products and services created to meet the diverse needs of 50+ partner organisations. Drawing on some inspiring and novel projects, Matt will show how GiGL data is used to support decision making, whether it be targeting action to alleviate inequalities in the public’s access to green ‐ space or ensuring positive outcomes for nature. 11.55 TBC

12.05 Peter Doherty, Atlas of Living Australia The Atlas of Living Australia – Open Infrastructure facilitates Innovation! The Atlas of Living Australia is the result of a $46m+ investment by the Australian Government and a strong partnership between Australian Museums, Herbaria, CSIRO, other Govt agencies and biological collections. The Atlas has delivered significant free and open infrastructure available over the Internet but also facilitates new and innovative products. Peter Doherty, born in Belfast and an actual “10 pound pom” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Pound_Poms) from a very young age (so no Northern Irish accent is detectable) ‐ is the Program Manager for the Atlas and will provide an overview of the system and opportunities for innovation. He will demonstrate how the Atlas is able to support data capture, management, discovery, visualisation and analysis of biodiversity and related data – particularly for Citizen Scientists and communities. Modern and open source IT products are used to manage a huge variety of data as represented by the rich diversity provided by nature – but additional value is also achieved by exposing both data and capabilities (such as species occurrence data, maps and mapping services) for re ‐ use in other websites and apps. The Atlas has built specific tools that engage, educate and empower Citizens – including tools such as “Explore your area”, the Volunteer Portal and advanced data capture tools used for single species observations through to advanced vegetation assessments. We are also working on tools to integrate data submission with crowdsourced identification along with alerting users to gaps in data in their local area or perhaps specific information as requested by Scientists. 12.25 Speed talks • John Tweddle, Natural History Museum ‘Introducing 'Identification: Trainers for the Future' The Identification Trainers for the Future project is an exciting new collaboration between the NHM, NBNT and FSC. Funded by HLF, it aims to proactively support the UK’s taxonomic skills ‐ base, with a focus on developing identification, biological recording and associated museum skills. Between 2015 ‐ 2018 the NHM will host fifteen, 12 ‐ month training placements for early career UK biodiversity professionals. These will provide each trainee with the expertise to help document, monitor and understand changes in the distribution and abundance of species in the UK, and to then pass on this knowledge to others. Alongside these core placements, the project will provide face ‐ to ‐ face identification training for up to 1,000 people and create a wide range of identification training resources. • Lori Lawson Handley, University of Hull ‘How will the molecular revolution contribute to biological recording?’ Recent advances in molecular technology including DNA barcoding, metabarcoding and environmental DNA (“eDNA”) are revolutionising the fields of taxonomy, evolutionary biology and ecology. Since species shed DNA into their surrounding environment, eDNA is a particularly attractive tool for non invasive biological recording. eDNA is proving more sensitive and cost effective than traditional detection methods, and has already proven to be very effective in detecting rare, endangered and invasive species. I will discuss the promise and potential pitfalls with eDNA, and suggest ways this technique could contribute to biological recording. • Chris Raper, Natural History Museum ‘ What’s next for the UK Species Inventory?’ Chris will describe his vision for how the UK Species Inventory will be developed in the next 10 years, both in terms of the administration tools and the scope of the database itself. • Charles Roper, Sussex Biodiversity Record Centre ‘Open Data: The Future of Data Sharing’ Open Data: The Future of Data Sharing. The World Wide Web has permeated our society and changed the way we think about finding, accessing and sharing information. Open Data promises the same for the way we think about data. A global movement, spearheaded by Sir Tim Berners ‐ Lee and Sir Nigel Shadbolt at the Open Data Institute and championed by governments, organisations and citizens around the world, Open Data has arrived. This talk offers a short introduction to the concept, a look at: why it's important, why you should pay attention and where to find further information. 14.05 The Sir John Burnett Memorial Lecture, 2014 – Professor Chris Thomas ‘Biodiversity Change and Conservation in the Anthropocene’ We are living in a period of rapid environmental change, including loss of megafauna, habitat change, nitrogen deposition and climate change. These environmental agents of change are, in combination, generating major changes to the distributions of species, a phenomenon that is particularly well documented in Britain where we benefit from NBN ‐ linked recording schemes. This dynamism in the distributions of species challenges us. Scientifically, we need to understand how present ‐ day patterns of biodiversity and the distributions of individual species have emerged from past environmental changes; and how they might change in future. In the context of conservation and pest control strategies, dynamic distributions and rapid recent evolution challenge our attitudes to non ‐ native species and novel hybrid species, and lead us to consider whether we should adopt conservation strategies that actively promote the conservation of species outside their historical ranges.