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A global study has found that degraded and modified landscapes such as croplands and pastures can still retain significant biodiversity value, hosting 18% of threatened terrestrial vertebrates and 10% of endangered plants. Although these human-altered areas are not an adequate substitute for fully intact wild habitat, they can complement and connect the protection of wildlands and natural ecosystems.
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The research recommends integrating biodiversity goals and habitat restoration efforts when managing agricultural areas and developed land, as even small changes could expand available habitat for declining species. Restoring native vegetation, limiting pesticides, and adopting wildlife-friendly farming practices in these modified environments may aid conservation.
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While intact, undisturbed habitat remains crucial for many rare species, the study suggests that restored and thoughtfully managed agricultural lands could play an important complementary role in conservation. The researchers conclude that we need to value and enhance the biodiversity potential of the working landscapes where people live and produce food.
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Degraded areas may be partially defunct ecologically but still retain wildlife value. Biodiversity can persist even in habitats modified for human use, such as croplands and pastures, especially if some native vegetation remains.
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Strategic habitat restoration in agricultural and developed areas could expand available habitat for threatened species and create connectivity between natural ecosystems. Even small habitat gains can aid declining wildlife in human-dominated landscapes.
I like this quote.
“The idea that we can have nature conservation of biodiversity in some parts of a landscape, country, or continent, and then have our food production landscapes and human-dominated landscapes in separate areas, I think is a bit ridiculous,” study co-author Ben Scheele, an ecologist at Australian National University, told Mongabay. “We really have to be serious about having wildlife in areas that are heavily human-modified.”
A realistic take on the damage we’ve done. To paraphrase one of my favourite quotes, we need to restore for function not history. Good enough is more realistic than perfect.
A functional approach is the only way to go at this point. Some ecosystems take over 250 years to re-establish. We simply don’t have enough time to get to that point. It should be our goal, obviously but during restoration we should aim to focus on returning the land capability as quickly as possible
The landscape I live in is heavily influenced by humans since prehistoric times, and it is also full of a mix of wild native, wild introduced, and human managed species of plants, fungi and animals. When you live in it it’s obvious that all this diversity is worthy of care and respect. I’m glad some people put the work in to collect the data on paper to make the obvious known to even the daftest regulator out there. Also, the nutrition density of such a landscape is amazing - only someone entirely out of their minds could come up with sth like huge monocultures.
I love that you can see the beauty in it all.
I work with a lot of people that come from the school of pre-colonial clearing and they’re right, but they also ignore what we have now like it’s all bad. You can take back what was done unfortunately.
But then I guess that some of us come from extremely biodiverse landscapes and some come from post-glacial, our ideas of pre-clearing landscapes may differ by a thousand species. Some may be easy to recreate, some near impossible.
I was totally depressed about all the destruction and until I got it: all we have is what is left now in the way it is, and we can learn to work with it in a good and healthy and sustainable way. I watch what my old neighbors do and I experiment with all sorts of permacultural ideas. I’ve always though restoration sounds a bit strange. You can never cross the same river twice, or recreate some situation from the past. This kind of thinking seems dangerously restricted - not saying it’s always the same kind of mind that also wants to keep bloodlines clean, but there are similarities in the tendency towards some desired purism not based in our current reality.
