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Ecological restoration is critical for recovering degraded ecosystems but is challenged by variable success and low predictability. Understanding which outcomes are more predictable and less variable following restoration can improve restoration effectiveness. Recent theory asserts that the predictability of outcomes would follow an order from most to least predictable from coarse to fine community properties (physical structure > taxonomic diversity > functional composition > taxonomic composition) and that predictability would increase with more severe environmental conditions constraining species establishment. We tested this "hierarchy of predictability" hypothesis by synthesizing outcomes along an aridity gradient with 11 grassland restoration projects across the United States. We used 1829 vegetation monitoring plots from 227 restoration treatments, spread across 52 sites. We fit generalized linear mixed‐effects models to predict six indicators of restoration outcomes as a function of restoration characteristics (i.e., seed mixes, disturbance, management actions, time since restoration) and used variance explained by models and model residuals as proxies for restoration predictability. We did not find consistent support for our hypotheses. Physical structure was among the most predictable outcomes when the response variable was relative abundance of grasses, but unpredictable for total canopy cover. Similarly, one dimension of taxonomic composition related to species identities was unpredictable, but another dimension of taxonomic composition indicating whether exotic or native species dominated the community was highly predictable. Taxonomic diversity (i.e., species richness) and functional composition (i.e., mean trait values) were intermittently predictable. Predictability also did not increase consistently with aridity. The dimension of taxonomic composition related to the identity of species in restored communities was more predictable (i.e., smaller residuals) in more arid sites, but functional composition was less predictable (i.e., larger residuals), and other outcomes showed no significant trend. Restoration outcomes were most predictable when they related to variation in dominant species, while those responding to rare species were harder to predict, indicating a potential role of scale in restoration predictability. Overall, our results highlight additional factors that might influence restoration predictability and add support to the importance of continuous monitoring and active management beyond one‐time seed addition for successful grassland restoration in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The largest remaining populations of the endangered huemul deer (Hippocamelus bisulcus) are believed to be concentrated in the remote, rugged and largely uninhabited glacial valleys and fjords surrounding the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that lie within Chile's Bernardo O'Higgins National Park. On the Park's northwestern edge is Bernardo Fjord, an area home to the world's largest known breeding population of huemul. We present a demographic study of this population and examine its population trends since 2004. We conducted huemul transect surveys on‐foot during 16 expeditions to Bernardo Fjord from October 2014 to March 2020, during which we spent a total of 254 days in the field and documented 284 observations of huemul. This coastal population of huemul exhibited higher female proportions (mean 0.64 ± SD 0.05), lower fawn:female ratios (mean 0.18 ± SD 0.23 in March and mean 0.22 ± SD 0.07 in November), and similar group sizes (mean 1.77 ± 1.06 SD individuals) to previous studies. Huemul densities in Bernardo Valley encountered from 2016 to 2019 were 60% lower than densities observed in a previous study from 2004 to 2008. We produce a 2019 huemul population estimate for Bernardo Fjord of 84 (±SD 7) individuals including 44 observed individuals and 40 (±SD 10) individuals estimated to be undetected by our surveys, which comprises 6–8% of the IUCN global population estimate. Two of the surveyed sectors – Bernardo Valley and Pampa – are of critical conservation importance, given that the 5 km2 Pampa is home to 42% of the total huemul population and 41% of the fawn population of Bernardo Fjord. We examine potential drivers of this population decline, which may include poor recruitment, predation and high incidences of foot disease exacerbated by climatic conditions, and we offer recommendations for the conservation, monitoring and management of this and other coastal huemul populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Shared ways of thinking in Brazil about the science-practice interface in ecology and conservation We aimed to identify and describe viewpoints on how the science-practice interface should work in order to improve conservation decisions by interviewing relevant actors, both scientists (ecologists or conservation scientists) and decision makers (who rely on basic and conservation-oriented ecological knowledge to make decisions). Interactive partners thought scientists had much to learn from decision makers (e.g., viability of potential actions, administrative and political constraints) and decision makers could learn from scientists how science contributes to informed decisions. Scientists in this group had diverse levels of productivity and engagement with practice, but decision makers had engaged in the last 5 years more directly with science than decision makers from other groups (Supporting Information). Finally, although some of our results suggest negative attitudes between scientists and decision makers (e.g., detached producers criticized decision makers for misinterpreting scientific knowledge), there was general agreement that addressing cultural differences is important for linking science and practice effectively. [Extracted from the article]

ABSTRACT: Applying scientific knowledge to confront societal challenges is a difficult task, an issue known as the science–practice gap. In Ecology and Conservation, scientific evidence has been seldom used directly to support decision‐making, despite calls for an increasing role of ecological science in developing solutions for a sustainable future. To date, multiple causes of the science–practice gap and diverse approaches to link science and practice in Ecology and Conservation have been proposed. To foster a transparent debate and broaden our understanding of the difficulties of using scientific knowledge, we reviewed the perceived causes of the science–practice gap, aiming to: (i) identify the perspectives of ecologists and conservation scientists on this problem, (ii) evaluate the predominance of these perspectives over time and across journals, and (iii) assess them in light of disciplines studying the role of science in decision‐making. We based our review on 1563 sentences describing causes of the science–practice gap extracted from 122 articles and on discussions with eight scientists on how to classify these sentences. The resulting process‐based framework describes three distinct perspectives on the relevant processes, knowledge and actors in the science–practice interface. The most common perspective assumes only scientific knowledge should support practice, perceiving a one‐way knowledge flow from science to practice and recognizing flaws in knowledge generation, communication, and/or use. The second assumes that both scientists and decision‐makers should contribute to support practice, perceiving a two‐way knowledge flow between science and practice through joint knowledge‐production/integration processes, which, for several reasons, are perceived to occur infrequently. The last perspective was very rare, and assumes scientists should put their results into practice, but they rarely do. Some causes (e.g. cultural differences between scientists and decision‐makers) are shared with other disciplines, while others seem specific to Ecology and Conservation (e.g. inadequate research scales). All identified causes require one of three general types of solutions, depending on whether the causal factor can (e.g. inadequate research questions) or cannot (e.g. scientific uncertainty) be changed, or if misconceptions (e.g. undervaluing abstract knowledge) should be solved. The unchanged predominance of the one‐way perspective over time may be associated with the prestige of evidence‐based conservation and suggests that debates in Ecology and Conservation lag behind trends in other disciplines towards bidirectional views ascribing larger roles to decision‐makers. In turn, the two‐way perspective seems primarily restricted to research traditions historically isolated from mainstream conservation biology. All perspectives represented superficial views of decision‐making by not accounting for limits to human rationality, complexity of decision‐making contexts, fuzzy science–practice boundaries, ambiguity brought about by science, and different types of knowledge use. However, joint knowledge‐production processes from the two‐way perspective can potentially allow for democratic decision‐making processes, explicit discussions of values and multiple types of science use. To broaden our understanding of the interface and foster productive science–practice linkages, we argue for dialogue among different research traditions within Ecology and Conservation, joint knowledge‐production processes between scientists and decision‐makers and interdisciplinarity across Ecology, Conservation and Political Science in both research and education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]