Tewksbury esa2015 centennial lecture

Ecology and Natural History in the Anthropocene

Photo: Sun on earth from the International Space Station © ESA / NASA

Joshua TewksburyWalker Endowed Professor of Natural History

Department of Biology and College of the EnvironmentUniversity of Washington

The Anthropocene

A good time to be aliveThe past 100 years have been very good for people

Human population

3.5x

Take of terrestrial biomass production

2x only

Per capita GDP4x

Sources: UNPD, The Madison Project, Krausmann et al. 2012 PNAS. Photo: Borneo © WWF-Canon

Conservation Science for the 21st century: boundaries, transformations and bringing science to the table

Josh TewksburyDirectorLuc Hoffmann Institute

decline in poverty

50% decline in malnourishment

33%

2xReal income,low & middle income countries

Sources: Mercedes de Onis et al. 2000, UN Millennium Development Goals Photo: Greenland © Wim van Passel / WWF-Canon

A good time to be aliveThe past 20 years have have been even better

Of terrestrial surface of the earth

50% We use

Of all freshwater54% We

use

Sources: Hooke and Martin-Duque 2012, Postel et al. 2012, Unicef, world energy outlookPhoto: Hong Kong; © Global Warming Images / WWF-Canon

People without enough water

1 bl +1.3 bl Lack

electricity

Challenging Earth SystemsIncreasing resource scarcity and inequality

Added to the middle class3 bl

78.1

9.3

10.6

1950 1975 2000 2025 2050 2075 2100

16

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

0

billi

ons

Fertility assumption High Medium Low

5 Billion

2 Billion

1 Billion

203020101990

Source: OECD 2010

Sources: UNPD 2013, OECD 2010Photo: Hong Kong; © Global Warming Images / WWF-Canon

And more challenges to comeHuman demand shifting into high gear

Science in theAnthropocene

Photo: Sun on earth from the International Space Station © ESA / NASA

Lubchenco ‘98Entering the century of the environment: A new social contract for science

Photo: Jane Lubchenco © BDSJS

The Social Contract: How can ecology and natural history most effectively embrace 21st century challenges?

Theory

Description

Experimental

ManipulationsComparison

(correlation)

Observation

Natural History: Attention to nature, from the scale of the organism to the scale of the landscape, and the body of honest, accessible work that comes from this attention.

“Ecology is a new name for a very old subject. It simply means scientific natural

history”-Elton 1927

Lu et al. 2009

Ciais et al. 2005

Diuk-Wasser 2012

IPPC 2007

Dry Days

Δ NPP summer

Δ NPP

Lu et al. 2009

Ciais et al. 2005Δ NPP summer

Δ NPP

Sources: OECD Stat

Brazil

China

Egypt

India

South Korea

USA*

0 20 40 60 80

100

AcademiaBusinessCivil Service¥

Diplomacy

EconomicsEngineeringLawMedicine

MilitaryTeachingOthers

Politicians by tribeThese are not ecologists

Sources: Economist, International Who’s Who, Congressional Research Service

Collaboration and Collective impact: boundary organizations and trans-disciplinary research

Ecology and sustainability

Photo: Fishing at sunset on the Mekong river, Vientiane, Laos; © Michèle Dépraz / WWF-Canon

Ecology and Natural History: rooted in observation, focused on prediction


Science Capacity

Policy / Practice Capacity

Evidence

Direction and Focus

Boundary Organizations

Gove

rnm

enta

l

Natural Science

Social Science

Non

-Gov

ernm

enta

l

Convention for the

Conservation and

Management of the Vicuña

International Agreement

on Polar Bears

Boundary Organizations in international Science and Conservation

Global Change Research Programs: a brief history

• Deliver knowledge for sustainability

• Build capacity to deliver solutions• Engage young scientists and

developing countries scientists• Expand the involvement of social

scientists and economists• Involve stakeholders and decision-

makers

Photo: Fishing in the Mekong © Tan Someth Bunwath / WWF-Cambodia

Focal Challenges

Food, Energy Water

Climate Change

Natural Assets and Ecosystem

Services

Resilient Cities

Viable Rural Futures

Human Health

Sustainable Consumption and

ProductionRisk

Management

Deliver water, energy, and food for all, and manage the synergies and trade-offs among them, by understanding how these interactions are shaped by environmental, economic, social and political changes.

Sources: International Energy Agency, FAO Photo: Modern irrigation for alfalfa fields. Najd, Saudi Arabia; © Bruno Pambour / WWF-Canon

Safeguard natural assets underpinning human well-being by understanding relationships between biodiversity, ecosystem functioning and services; and developing effective valuation and governance approaches.

Focal Challenges

• International• Interdisciplinary• Trans-disciplinary

(knowledge to action) (co-creation)

How international is Ecology?Co-Authorship analysis

Source: Elsevier Research Intelligence: SCOPUS data

80

60

40

20

0

% o

f pap

ers i

n Ec

olog

y Jo

urna

ls w

ith in

tern

ation

al co

llabo

rato

rs

% of ALL papers with international collaborators

Ecology papers more likely to have international collaborations

10 20 30 40 50 60

2.5

2.0

1.5

1.0

0.5

0Cita

tion

Impa

ct In

tern

ation

al

colla

bora

tions

in E

colo

gy0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2

Citation ImpactAll Ecology

Ecology papers with international collaborations are cited more often

2009 20092013 2013

How interdisciplinary is Ecology?Citation analysis

Germany

12.5

10.0

7.5

5.0

2.5

0

Shar

e of

top

10%

of

Inte

rdisc

iplin

ary

pape

rs (%

)

JapanUK FranceChinaUS

EcologyAll Disciplines

21.81.61.41.21.00.80.60.40.3

0Ci

tatio

n Im

pact

Top

10%

Inte

rdisc

iplin

ary

pape

rs0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2

Citation Impactall papers

Interdisciplinary papers in ecology are cited less often than average papers

Ecology papers are less interdisciplinary than The average SCOPUS paper

Source: Elsevier Research Intelligence: SCOPUS data from 2009 through 2013

How does the science get used?Where does the evidence for action come from?

Source: Guizam, Brooks and Tewksbury - unpublished

9 report series316 reports

44,038 citations

An alternative evidence ecosystem?Majority of evidence is not from the peer reviewed literature

Source: Guizar, Brooks and Tewksbury - unpublished

Avg. % of citations from peer reviewed sources

19-2560

40

20

0

Perc

ent o

f cita

tions

from

pee

r re

view

ed li

tera

ture

TNC Ecoregional

Assessments

IUCN Ecosystem

Manage

IUCNEnviron.

Law

IUCN / WCPAProtect. Area

BestPractices

WWF Living Planet Report

IUCN Species Survival

Commission

UNEP Year Book

Stateof the

Worlds Birds

Advances in Applied

Biodiversity Science

n=3 3 6 11144 2376106


Num

ber o

f Rep

orts

90

60

30

0

0 100 200 300 400

Which journals get cited?Conservation and Ecology

Conservation Biology

Number of Citations

Biological Conservation

Science

NatureBioscience

Ecological Applications

Ecology

Oryx

Journal of Wildlife

Management

PNAS

324 most cited journals in 316 reports; 8327

citations (80% of total)


Which fields inform conservation?Ecology, and more Ecology.

Num

ber o

f Jou

rnal

s

75

50

25

00 500 1000 1500

Number of Citations

324 most cited journals in 316

reports; 8327 citations

Ecology, Evolution,

Behavior and Systematics

Ecology

Animal Science and Zoology

Nature and Landscape Conservation

Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law

Aquatic Science

Agricultural and Biological science

General Science

Citations from ecology subject areas vs. citations from all social science subject areas combined

10 to 1

Challenges are• International• Interdisciplinary• Trans-disciplinary

(knowledge to action) (co-creation)

Photo: palm tree fruit collected in Borneo, Malaysia© naturepl.com / Christophe Courteau / WWF-Canon

Oil Palm as a socio-ecological systemCo-creating locally-relevant solutions across countries

Joshua Tewksbury

Use this example, or another, with a bit more data - LIVES perhaps - to illustrate Co-creation. Possibly put in bowtie to start

Oil Palm as a socio-ecological systemCo-creating locally-relevant solutions across countries

Photo: First meeting of the Oil Palm Adaptive Landscapes (OPAL) project


Science as Service

Science as serviceTrans-disciplinaryUser-focusedCo-createdSolution oriented

Scalable and transportable

ChallengesFood, Water, Energy, Cities,

Consumption & Production, Climate, Sustainable Use and Protection of Aquatic and Terrestrial Ecosystems

ServiceScience, Information, Collaboration, Innovation, Education, Engagement

SolutionsHealthy landscapes, freshwater

systems and oceans; clean air; just, equitable societies; livable cities;

healthy people

Collaboration and Collective impact: boundary organizations and trans-disciplinary research

Ecology and sustainability


Ecology and Natural History: rooted in observation, focused on prediction

Natural History: perpetually on the verge of extinction

Exposure: minimum natural history required for a BS in Biology

Year: P < 0.0001 (LRT test)(GLLM w/ 35 institutions; institution as random effect, Poisson error structure)

2.25

2.0

1.0

0.5

0.0

0.0

is declining

Exposure

Tewksbury et al. 2014, Bioscience

Natural history in introductory biology texts from 1930 to 2011

Exposure

0.6

0.4

0.2

0.0Na

tura

l hist

ory

mat

eria

l in

colle

ge b

iolo

gy te

xtbo

oks (

prop

. of t

otal

)

1955

1965

1975

1985

1995

2005 Modified Logistic

[y =y0 + a/(1+(x/x0)b)] w/ 38 texts): RSS / TSS = 0.92

3

2

1

Min

imum

nat

ural

hist

ory

cour

ses f

or a

BS

in B

iolo

gy19

3519

45

Exposure is declining

Tewksbury et al. 2014, Bioscience

“Do black grapes of the desert have a basic

thirst for tears?”-P. Neruda

US and Europe have been losing herberia

since 1990

Global

NorthAmerica

Europe

“Do black grapes of the desert have a basic

thirst for tears?”-P. Neruda

Consolidation of collections

EuropeUS

Access

B. Thiers, in New York Botanical Garden's Virtual Herbarium.

(2012)

NaturalHistory

Upgrade

Richard Conniff, Conservation 2014

Future:A prescription for 21st century natural history and

ecology

21st century– Collaboration and

Curation

– Transparency and Technology

Collaboration: Working as a community

1995

2000

2005

2010

0.20

0.15

0.10

0.05

0

% o

f pap

ers b

y to

pic

1985

1990

Collaboration: Organizing amateur naturalists

Theobald et al. 2015Biological Conservation

200

150

100

50

0Ci

tizen

Scie

nce

Prog

ram

Initi

ated

BiodiversityNatural HistoryClimate changeInvasivesLand use changeOverexploitation citizen science

programs growing faster than peer

reviewed literature

A lot more than birds


Gathering a wide swath of Natural

History data

Industrial Scale Natural History


> 1.3 million people and > $1.4 billion in

spending each year

10 100 1000 10000 1000001

10

100

1000

10000

100000

1000000

Spatial Extent (“up to” km bins)

Cur

rent

Par

ticip

ants

(val

ue o

r med

ian) fine grain, broad extent

Consistency matters

Theobald et al. 2015Biol. Conservation

and unpublished data

Long term participants

collecting long term data-sets

1 10 100 10001

10

100

1000

10000

100000

1000000

Longevity (years)

25+ years

Curre

nt P

artic

ipan

ts (v

alue

or

med

ian)

1-4 6-12 24+ Var0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

% o

f Pro

ject

sSamples / year

4+ 3 2 1Years with project:

Future:A prescription for 21st century natural history and

ecology

21st century– Collaboration and

Curation

– Transparency and Technology

Professional ecologists are exceptionally well placed to lead

Much of the data we collect never gets shared

– 57% of papers from NSF funded grants in Ecology share no data

– Very little of the data shared is outside of molecular and phylogenetic data repositories

Hampton et al. Front Ecol Environ 2013; 11(3): 156–162

We are building the stadiums, but most of us are not going to the games

• Getting out of the dark will require– More transparency and

collaboration (within and across disciplines)

– More incentive structures that reward the collection and curation of natural history

– A flattening of ecology (more amateur experts, treating natural history as civics)

Tewksbury esa2015 centennial lecture

Environment

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