I saw an interesting talk in the speed sessions. These are four minute talks followed by a long interaction session, where all the presenters sit at tables and one can go up and chat with them. Excellent format, in my opinion.

The talk was on whether or not corridors make or break animal species living in forest fragments. In a lot of places in the world, what was once a forest remains only as small patches like islands surrounded by a sea of cultivated or developed land. The thinking has been that in order to keep gene flow moving between the inhabitants of these patches, corridors of trees need to be provided, like bridges between islands. The conventional wisdom that these corridors were also necessary for many birds, including the subject of the study, the small, ant-eating Australian brown treecreeper.

A team of eight spent months following treecreepers around near the town of Wagga Wagga, in both properly corridored areas as well as areas with patches and miscellaneous non-connected trees. Project leaders Erik and Veronica Doerr at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization in Canberra Australia found that the birds, despite being “dumpy” fliers, in the words of Erik Doerr, moved patch to patch and made forays just as often without purpose-built corridors.

“There is a bit of corridor obsession at the moment,” said Erik. While he cautions—of course—that these results are quite preliminary and of unknown generalizability, he does think that perhaps having patches that are large and relatively close together may turn out a bit more important than having the perfect, 40-metre-wide leafy green Champs Elysées between them.

Speed presentation MC Marc Hunter, strolling by Doerr’s table during the meet and greet session added that "people are starting to replace the term corridor with the broader term “connectivity”, which is whatever it takes to get the animal across the landscape."

I saw an interesting talk in the speed sessions. These are four minute talks followed by a long interaction session, where all the presenters sit at tables and one can go up and chat with them. Excellent format, in my opinion.

The talk was on whether or not corridors make or break animal species living in forest fragments. In a lot of places in the world, what was once a forest remains only as small patches like islands surrounded by a sea of cultivated or developed land. The thinking has been that in order to keep gene flow moving between the inhabitants of these patches, corridors of trees need to be provided, like bridges between islands. The conventional wisdom that these corridors were also necessary for many birds, including the subject of the study, the small, ant-eating Australian brown treecreeper.

A team of eight spent months following treecreepers around near the town of Wagga Wagga, in both properly corridored areas as well as areas with patches and miscellaneous non-connected trees. Project leaders Erik and Veronica Doerr at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization in Canberra Australia found that the birds, despite being “dumpy” fliers, in the words of Erik Doerr, moved patch to patch and made forays just as often without purpose-built corridors.

“There is a bit of corridor obsession at the moment,” said Erik. While he cautions—of course—that these results are quite preliminary and of unknown generalizability, he does think that perhaps having patches that are large and relatively close together may turn out a bit more important than having the perfect, 40-metre-wide leafy green Champs Elysées between them.

Speed presentation MC Marc Hunter, strolling by Doerr’s table during the meet and greet session added that "people are starting to replace the term corridor with the broader term “connectivity”, which is whatever it takes to get the animal across the landscape."