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Concerning declines in insect populations have been reported from Europe and the United States, yet there are gaps in our knowledge of the drivers of insect trends and their distribution across the world. We report on our analysis of a spatially extensive, 14-year study of ground-dwelling beetles in four natural forest biomes spanning Japan's entire latitudinal range (3000 km). Beetle species richness, abundance and biomass declined in evergreen coniferous forests but increased in broadleaf-coniferous mixed forests. Further, beetles in evergreen coniferous forests responded negatively to increased temperature and precipitation anomalies, which have both risen over the study's timespan. These significant changes parallel reports of climate-driven changes in forest tree species, providing further evidence that climate change is altering forest ecosystems fundamentally. Given the enormous biodiversity and ecosystem services that forests support globally, the implications for biodiversity change resulting from climate change could be profound.

Abstract As growing urban populations have fewer chances to experience nature, i.e., ‘the extinction of experience’, the subsequent loss of emotional affinities for biodiversity (biophilia) pose major challenges to environmental conservation. Gardening, as an everyday nature interaction and window into invertebrate ecological functioning may offer opportunities to develop biophilia. However, the associations between gardening and biophilia/biophobia towards invertebrates remains untested. We conducted an online survey (n = 443) with adults in Japan about their nature and gardening experiences, demographics, and species identification knowledge in relation to their biophilia (like) and biophobia (dislike, fear, and disgust) towards invertebrates. We also asked participants about their perceptions of invertebrates as ‘beneficials’ or ‘pests’. From responses, we ranked invertebrates according to the attitudes held towards them. We found that frequent gardeners were more likely to express biophilia and perceive invertebrates as beneficial, and generally less likely to express biophobia towards invertebrates. Frequency of visits to recreational parks, but not national/state parks was associated with increased biophilia and reduced dislike and fear of invertebrates. Our results suggest that gardening, in addition to localised nature experiences, acts as a possible pathway towards appreciation of invertebrate biodiversity. We recommend that policymakers and conservation organisations view urban gardening as a potential tool to minimise the negative impacts of the extinction of experience. Implications for insect conservation As people are more likely to conserve what they love, finding ways to nurture positive attitudes towards insects is critical for the public support needed for successful insect conservation. Considering gardening is a relatively accessible form of nature connection even in cities, our findings of the association between gardening and biophilia towards invertebrates holds promise for potential pathways towards fostering support for insect conservation now and into the future.

There is growing concern over the loss of grassland and forest species worldwide due to land use changes. In Japan, young forest plantations provide important habitats for grassland species. However, the decline in forest logging frequency has led to a decrease in the area of young plantations, which may in turn cause a decline in the number of grassland species. Power line corridors in forest plantations can act as habitats for early and late successional species, as they contain vegetation in diverse stages. This study evaluated the importance of these corridor zones as habitats for early and late successional butterflies in Japan. The species richness and abundance of butterflies were recorded in power line corridors, young plantations, forest roads, and mature plantations. Vegetation height and food resource availability for larvae and adult butterflies were also measured. The species richness and abundance of those of late successional butterflies were highest in power line corridors and young plantations, and lowest in mature plantations; and early successional butterflies and food resource availability were highest in power line corridors, and lowest in mature plantations. The species richness and abundance of butterflies within power line corridors were largely explained by vegetation height and food resource availability. Our results indicate that power line corridors within conifer plantations provide important habitats for early and late successional butterflies. Increasing the habitat value of power line corridors through appropriate vegetation management can have an important role in preserving insect species.

1. The stress-gradient hypothesis (SGH) provides a conceptual framework for explaining howenvironmental context determines the nature of biotic interactions. It may be also useful for predicting geographic variability in the effect of management interventions on biological invasions. We aimed to test hypotheses consistent with the SGH to explain context dependency in bamboo invasion of secondary forests in Japan, and establish a predictive understanding of forest management impacts on invasion.2. We use a priori physiological knowledge of invasive giant bamboo, Phyllostachys bambusoides, to generate hypotheses consistent with the SGH. We modelled variation in giant bamboo occupancy within 810 secondary forest plots across the broad environmental gradients of Japan using a national vegetation database.3. Consistent with the SGH, we find that the effect of tree canopy cover on bamboo occupancy depends on interactions between solar radiation and mean annual temperature. In cool regions with high solar radiation – stressful conditions for bamboo – shade cast by dense canopies facilitates invasion. However, in warmer regions that are more benign, dense canopies tend to inhibit spread via competition for light, space and other resources.4. We used our findings to characterise geographic variability in the effect of forest thinning, a widespread management intervention used to enhance forest biodiversity, on the risk of bamboo spread into secondary forests in Japan. Thinning forest canopies to increase understorey light radiation should limit bamboo spread in cooler regions, while tree planting to increase canopy shade should limit bamboo spread in warmer regions. We provide evidence that the SGH can inform practical recommendations for invasive species control.

The coronavirus (COVID‐19) pandemic and the global response have dramatically changed people's lifestyles in much of the world. These major changes, as well as the associated changes in impacts on the environment, can alter the dynamics of the direct interactions between humans and nature (hereafter human–nature interactions) far beyond those concerned with animals as sources of novel human coronavirus infections. There may be a variety of consequences for both people and nature.Here, we suggest a conceptual framework for understanding how the COVID‐19 pandemic might affect the dynamics of human–nature interactions. This highlights three different, but not mutually exclusive, pathways: changes in (a) opportunity, (b) capability and (c) motivation.Through this framework, we also suggest that there are several feedback loops by which changes in human–nature interactions induced by the COVID‐19 pandemic can lead to further changes in these interactions such that the impacts of the pandemic could persist over the long term, including after it has ended.The COVID‐19 pandemic, which has had the most tragic consequences, can also be viewed as a ‘global natural experiment’ in human–nature interactions that can provide unprecedented mechanistic insights into the complex processes and dynamics of these interactions and into possible strategies to manage them to best effect. A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article., A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article.

Extinction of experience, the progressive loss of human–nature interactions, may prove to be one of the key environmental concepts of our times. Not only does this loss reduce the important benefits that people gain from these interactions, but it may also undermine their support for pro‐biodiversity policies and management actions, and thus play an important role in shaping the future of biodiversity. Here, to help improve understanding, encourage a more consistent approach and highlight research gaps, we consider some of the key features of the concept of extinction of experience, contentions that these have caused and propose some solutions. We focus particularly on the importance of (a) the definition of nature employed; (b) whether direct or other human–nature interactions are considered; (c) the differences between the loss and the extinction of experience; (d) the timing of the loss of interactions that is considered and (e) the difference between human–nature interactions and human–nature experiences. Differentiating between narrow and broad senses of nature, between childhood and lifelong timings, and between interactions and experiences leads to a typology of eight different forms of extinction of experience. Such a classification can be useful for targeting research, furthering understanding of the processes and dynamics of the extinction of experience, and developing policies to reduce this phenomenon and minimize its negative consequences. A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article.

Paddy fields play an important role as alternative habitats for various wetland-dependent species. Agricultural intensification in paddy fields, however, presents serious threats to these species. Here, we examined the environmental factors, including those related to modern farming practices, affecting the distribution of the Sado wrinkled frog (Glandirana susurra) in paddy fields on Sado Island, Japan. We recorded the abundance of frogs at 42 sites in early and late June 2014 and investigated the species’ responses to several local and landscape-scale variables. We found that frog abundances decreased sharply following the drainage of paddy fields in mid-June and were negatively associated with deep concrete irrigation ditches that surrounded the paddies. The addition of conservation ditches built into rice paddy fields, however, was shown to mitigate against the effects of the drainage. Our results suggest that conservation ditches serve as refuges for G. susurra. We propose that decreasing the depth of irrigation ditches or providing structures for frogs to use and traverse the ditches could be useful approaches that help conserve G. susurra. We also suggest the increased use of conservation ditches and implementation of aquatic biotopes in the surrounding landscape might serve to aid this species’ long-term conservation.

As society becomes increasingly urbanized, children are becoming much less likely to experience nature. This progressive disengagement from the natural world, often termed the ‘extinction of experience’, has been viewed both as a key public health issue and one of the most fundamental obstacles to halting global environmental degradation. School education has an important role in mitigating and reversing the ongoing extinction of experience. Here, we examine the role of several factors that determine the implementation intensities of nature-based education by science teachers in the classrooms of both primary and secondary schools. We performed a large-scale questionnaire survey comprising 363 elementary and 259 lower-secondary schoolteachers. Several factors predicted the implementation intensity of nature-based education in schools. The most important predictor was teachers’ levels of nature-relatedness, with nature-orientated teachers being more likely to provide nature-based education in their classes. Levels of teachers’ ecological knowledge, frequency of childhood nature experiences, and greenness within the school were also positively associated with the implementation intensity of education. Our results suggest that, to promote nature-based education in schools, it is important to increase schoolteachers’ nature-relatedness and ecological knowledge, as well as to provide more green spaces within schools.

Urbanization is increasing globally with wide‐ranging consequences for biodiversity and the ecological processes it performs. Yet knowledge of the range of ecological processes supported by biodiversity in urban environments, and the different taxa that perform these processes is poorly understood. We used a text‐analysis approach to identify the research trends and gaps in knowledge in the literature on ecological processes provided by animals in urban environments. We found a divide in urban ecological processes research that grouped studies into those with an explicit link to ecological processes and those that focused on biodiversity and made an implicit link to ecological processes. We also found that the dominant taxa in urban ecological processes research were insects, which has more than twice as many studies as birds or mammals, potentially due to their recognized and explicit link to key processes and services (e.g., pollination, pollution biomonitoring) and disservices (e.g., pests, disease transmission). We found a further split between terrestrial and aquatic studies, with urban aquatic studies also declining in relative prevalence over the last 20 yr. To consolidate and advance research on ecological processes in urban environments, we suggest it will be important to bridge the divide between studies on explicit services and others on more general biodiversity. This might be achieved by placing greater focus on the processes provided by non‐insect taxa, and by integrating aquatic and terrestrial perspectives.

Understanding the dynamics of public interest in invasive alien species (IAS) is important for the establishment of effective strategies to prevent their spread and mitigate the negative social impacts thereof. Our knowledge of this topic is still limited, however, largely because of the difficulty in collecting data regarding public interest in IAS at a sufficiently large scale and for a long period. Here, we use relative search volume (RSV) on Google as a proxy of the general public’s interest in IAS and investigate its spatio-temporal distributions and drivers in Japan. We analyzed the data for 31 major IAS in Japan and found that the spatial distribution of RSV was predicted by both the actual distribution of IAS and the number of news articles featuring these species. Path analyses revealed that the presence of IAS increased RSV both directly and indirectly thorough an increase in the total number of news articles in local newspapers. Also, time-series analysis of the RSV for serial invasion of Solenopsis invicta, a recently detected IAS in Japan, demonstrated that the local RSV for this species increased sharply after the official announcement of its invasion was made. Overall, our study demonstrates that public interest in IAS varies greatly both spatially and temporally, and this variation was predicted by both ecological and social factors associated with IAS. Understanding the patterns of variation in public interest in IAS and its key drivers should help us to design more responsive and effective strategies to control these species.

Overgrazing by large mammalian herbivores has led to significant adverse impacts on ecosystems globally. Insects are often a key taxon affected by large herbivores because the plants that are grazed provide crucial food and habitat. By changing vegetation, overgrazing by herbivores could affect aspects of insect morphology, including through changes to larval development due to reduced food availability, and adult dispersal ability due to habitat fragmentation. We investigated the wing morphology of moth species in two contrasting sites at Lake Toya in Hokkaido, Japan. We compared moths on Nakajima Island where deer are overabundant, with moths from the lakeshore 3 km away where deer are far less abundant. We compared forewing size and aspect ratio (length/width) of 13 moth species from both lakeshore and island sites. Four species, three of which were herb-feeding generalists, had significantly smaller wings on the island compared with the lakeshore. Seven species demonstrated a reduction in wing aspect ratio, whereas one species, the largest we measured, showed an increase in wing aspect ratio. We suggest that these morphological changes could be induced by overgrazing by deer (i.e., a reduction in moth host plant biomass and quality) and/or the isolation of moth populations on Nakajima Island. Further work is needed to reveal how these confounded but potentially interacting effects contribute to the morphological changes we found in the moths on the island. Our results show that habitat isolation and overabundance of deer populations can affect moth wing morphology, with potential implications for their population dynamics and community structure.

In our increasingly urbanised world, children are becoming disconnected from the natural world. This progressive separation of humans from nature, “extinction of experience,” is viewed both as a major public health issue and as one of the fundamental obstacles to halting global biodiversity loss. Thus, it has become increasingly important to understand what drives and limits children’s direct experiences of nature. We administered a large-scale questionnaire to 5801 children from 45 elementary schools in Tochigi, central Japan. Children were asked to provide information on frequency of nature experiences, extent of nature relatedness, time pressure, inclination towards screen-based media, and their family members’ attitudes towards nature-based activities (family members’ nature orientation). We also calculated the proportion of urbanised areas within a 1-km radius of each school. Results showed that the frequency of children’s nature experiences was significantly positively associated with individual nature relatedness and family members’ nature orientation; time pressure and inclination towards screen-based media were not significantly negatively related to children’s frequency of nature experiences. Degree of urbanisation had significant negative influences on the frequency of direct experiences of nature. Male children participated in nature-based activities more frequently. Overall, our study demonstrates that children’s direct engagement with neighbourhood nature is shaped by multiple opportunity- and orientation-related factors, which has important policy implications as it implies that there can be no simple, straightforward way to promote children’s nature experiences. Thus, to minimise the ongoing extinction of experience, a variety of different and complementary approaches must be taken.

Data availability statement: No data was used in this study. Peer review: The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1002/2688-8319.12032. Supporting Information: eso312032-sup-0001-SuppMat.docx (21.1 KB) available at: https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/action/downloadSupplement?doi=10.1002%2F2688-8319.12032&file=eso312032-sup-0001-SuppMat.docx. Please note: The publisher is not responsible for the content or functionality of any supporting information supplied by the authors. Any queries (other than missing content) should be directed to the corresponding author for the article. Copyright © 2021 The Authors. 1. To be effective, the next generation of conservation practitioners and managers need to be critical thinkers with a deep understanding of how to make evidence-based decisions and of the value of evidence synthesis. 2. If, as educators, we do not make these priorities a core part of what we teach, we are failing to prepare our students to make an effective contribution to conservation practice. 3. To help overcome this problem we have created open access online teaching materials in multiple languages that are stored in Applied Ecology Resources. So far, 117 educators from 23 countries have acknowledged the importance of this and are already teaching or about to teach skills in appraising or using evidence in conservation decision-making. This includes 145 undergraduate, postgraduate or professional development courses. 4. We call for wider teaching of the tools and skills that facilitate evidence-based conservation and also suggest that providing online teaching materials in multiple languages could be beneficial for improving global understanding of other subject areas. Making informed conservation and ecosystem management choices is based upon a sound understanding of the relevant evidence. There is an increasing wealth of conservation science available, and access to this is becoming easier. But, are conservation practitioners being trained to utilize this information? In conservation, decision-making is often based upon past experience or expert knowledge, as opposed to the full body of scientific literature (e.g., Pullin, Knight, Stone, & Charman, 2004; Rafidimanantsoa, Poudyal, Ramamonjisoa, & Jones, 2018). The failure to include scientific evidence in decision-making has the potential to reduce the effectiveness of management, or even lead to detrimental actions being undertaken (Walsh, Dicks, & Sutherland, 2015). Evidence-based conservation (EBC) seeks to avoid this by providing tools to facilitate and inform decision-making. To do this, scientific evidence is collated and critically appraised for its quality and relevance, and integrated with other knowledge, experience, values and costs (Sutherland, Pullin, Dolman, & Knight, 2004). Wider adoption of EBC requires conservation professionals to be trained in its principles and taught how to use it to inform conservation decision-making. MAVA Foundation; Arcadia Fund.

The COVID‐19 pandemic and its global response have resulted in unprecedented and rapid changes to most people’s day‐to‐day lives. To slow the spread of the virus, governments have implemented the practice of physical distancing (“social distancing”), which includes isolation within the home with limited time spent outdoors. During this extraordinary time, nature around the home may play a key role in mitigating against adverse mental health outcomes due to the pandemic and the measures taken to address it. To assess whether this is the case, we conducted an online questionnaire survey (n = 3,000) in Tokyo, Japan, to quantify the association between five mental health outcomes (depression, life satisfaction, subjective happiness, self‐esteem, and loneliness) and two measures of nature experiences (frequency of greenspace use and green view through windows from home). Accounting for sociodemographic and lifestyle variables, we found that the frequency of greenspace use and the existence of green window views from within the home was associated with increased levels of self‐esteem, life satisfaction, and subjective happiness and decreased levels of depression, anxiety, and loneliness. Our findings suggest that a regular dose of nature can contribute to the improvement of a wide range of mental health outcomes. With the recent escalation in the prevalence of mental health disorders, and the possible negative impacts of the COVID‐19 pandemic on public mental health, our findings have major implications for policy, suggesting that urban nature has great potential to be used as a “nature‐based solution” for improved public health.

ContextFunctional responses to landscape heterogeneity are context-dependent, hampering the transferability of landscape-scale conservation initiatives. Japan provides a unique opportunity to test for regional modification of landscape effects due to its broad temperature gradient, coincident with a gradient of historical disturbance intensity.ObjectivesTo quantify and understand how regional contexts modify forest bird community responses to landscape heterogeneity across Japan.MethodsWe characterised the functional trait composition and diversity of breeding bird communities from 297 forest sites, and applied a cross-scale analytical framework to explain regional variation in community responses.ResultsThe effects of landscape diversity, coincident with forest loss, varied in strength and even direction across the temperature gradient. Cool regions of Japan with highly forested, homogeneous landscapes supported bird communities dominated by forest specialists: those with narrow habitat breadths and insectivorous diets. Warmer regions comprised communities dominated by generalists with wider habitat breadths, even in contiguous, highly forested landscapes. Heterogeneous landscapes selected for generalists, and only promoted functional trait diversity in cool regions where both specialists and generalists can be supplied by a diverse regional pool.ConclusionsOur results provide evidence that regional variation in trait responses to landscape heterogeneity—driven by past environmental filtering and broad-scale climates—leads to differential community responses across Japan. Future research that seeks a nuanced understanding of the regional modification of landscape variables will better serve to inform and target real-world conservation efforts.

People are becoming less likely to experience nature, as we become an increasingly urban society. This progressive disengagement of humans from the natural world, “extinction of experience”, has been viewed both as a key public health issue and one of the most fundamental obstacles to halting global environmental degradation. However, while the existence and significance of the phenomenon are generally agreed upon, it remains surprisingly poorly documented, particularly at large scales and over the longer-term. Here, we report the findings from a web-based questionnaire survey (n = 1147) to assess the extent of people’s childhood experiences with neighborhood flowering, plants, one of the most popular and visible group of organisms, in Japan. Results showed that people’s levels of childhood experiences with neighborhood flowering plants were positively related to their age: older participants, compared to younger ones, reported higher frequencies of childhood experiences with neighborhood flowering plants. The reported number of neighborhood flowering plant species that participants have directly experienced during childhood was also higher for older participants. Among the 21 flowering plant species we investigated, age-related decline in direct experiences during childhood was observed for 9 species, particularly for those that depend on grasslands (an ecosystem that has been in dramatic decline over the last few decades). Participants’ age and childhood environment (urban vs. rural settings) also had significant effects on their levels of childhood nature experiences. Overall, our results suggest that children’s direct connection to neighborhood biodiversity is indeed progressively dwindling, which can have serious implications for public health and biodiversity conservation.

MS was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (grant no. 16K00631), and KJG by the Natural Environment Research Council (grant no. NE/J015237/1).

Dramatic increases in populations of large mammalian herbivores have become a major ecological issue, particularly in the northern hemisphere, due to their substantial impacts on both animal and plant communities through processes such as grazing, browsing, and trampling. However, little is known about the consequences of these population explosions on ecosystem functions. Here, we experimentally investigated how the population density of sika deer (Cervus nippon) in temperate deciduous forest areas in Japan affected the decomposition of mammal dung by dung beetles, which is a key process in forest ecosystems. We measured a range of environmental variables (e.g., vegetation cover, soil hardness) and the dung decomposition rate, measured as the amount of deer dung decomposed during one week, and sampled dung beetles at 16 study sites with three different deer densities (high/intermediate/low). We then used structural equation modeling to investigate the relationships between deer density, environmental variables, the biomass of dung beetles (classified into small or large species), and the dung decomposition rate. We found that the biomass of small species increased with increasing deer density, whereas that of large species was not related to deer density. Furthermore, the dung decomposition rate was positively related to the biomass of small species but unrelated to that of large species. Overall, our results showed that an increase in deer density affects the decomposition rate of mammal dung by changing the structure of dung beetle communities (i.e., increasing the number of small dung beetles). Such an understanding of how increases in large herbivore populations affect ecosystem functions is important for accurately evaluating the ecological consequences of their overabundance and ultimately managing their populations appropriately.

Both the conservation of biodiversity and the maintenance of ecosystem services are important and fundamental goals in response to the current biodiversity crisis. Cultural ecosystem services – the non-material benefits people derive from their interactions with nature – are an important component of ecosystem services. However, determining the contributions of different components of biodiversity to these benefits has proven more challenging than for other ecosystem services. Here, we determine the relative contributions of diversity (measured as cultivar richness) and abundance (number of individuals) to the aesthetic value of flowering plant communities, using sunflowers as a model organism. We created grassland vegetation plots consisting of different numbers of sunflower cultivars and individuals, presented these treatments to people, and measured their aesthetic preferences (both self-reported and objective behavioural measures) towards them. We found that people’s aesthetic preferences were unrelated to differences in the cultivar richness of the plots but increased substantially with the number of individuals. More importantly, these preference patterns did not differ with a participants’ nature orientation, ecological knowledge, or gender, suggesting the generality of the results. Our findings indicate that the abundance of wildlife can play a crucial role in shaping the cultural services provided by ecosystems. Researchers and policy-makers should therefore pay more attention to the role of abundance in maintaining ecosystem services.