Tim R. New – författare

This handbook presents a comprehensive overview of insect conservation and provides practical solutions to counteract insect declines, at a time where insects are facing serious threats across the world from habitat destruction to invasive species and climate change.

The Routledge Handbook of Insect Conservation consist of six sections, covering all aspects of insect conservation, containing contributions from academics, researchers and practitioners from across the globe. Section I addresses the fundamentals of insect conservation and outlines the reason why insects are important and discusses the greatest drivers of insect decline. The chapters in Section II examine the approaches that can be used for insect conservation globally, such as protected areas and agroecology, while highlighting the importance of insects in the composition and function of ecosystems. The chapters in Section III focus on insect populations in the major biomes around the world, from temperate and tropical forests to savannas and grasslands, with the chapters in Section IV focusing on natural and manmade ecosystems of the world, including mountain, soil, urban, island and agricultural habitats. They discuss the unique pressures and challenges for each biome and ecosystem and offer practical solutions for conserving their insect populations. Section V focuses on the assessment and monitoring of insects for conservation, discussing how we can implement practical monitoring protocols and what options are available. A wide variety of methods and tools are examined, including citizen science, bioindication, the role of taxonomy, drones and eDNA. The book concludes by examining policy and education strategies for insect conservation in Section VI. The chapters discuss key issues around social and policy strategies and conservation legislation for ensuring the long-term protection of insects.

This book is essential reading for students and scholars of biodiversity conservation and entomology as well as professionals and policymakers involved in conservation looking for real-world solutions to the threats facing insects across the globe.

This handbook presents a comprehensive overview of insect conservation and provides practical solutions to counteract insect declines, at a time where insects are facing serious threats across the world from habitat destruction to invasive species and climate change.

The Routledge Handbook of Insect Conservation consist of six sections, covering all aspects of insect conservation, containing contributions from academics, researchers and practitioners from across the globe. Section I addresses the fundamentals of insect conservation and outlines the reason why insects are important and discusses the greatest drivers of insect decline. The chapters in Section II examine the approaches that can be used for insect conservation globally, such as protected areas and agroecology, while highlighting the importance of insects in the composition and function of ecosystems. The chapters in Section III focus on insect populations in the major biomes around the world, from temperate and tropical forests to savannas and grasslands, with the chapters in Section IV focusing on natural and manmade ecosystems of the world, including mountain, soil, urban, island and agricultural habitats. They discuss the unique pressures and challenges for each biome and ecosystem and offer practical solutions for conserving their insect populations. Section V focuses on the assessment and monitoring of insects for conservation, discussing how we can implement practical monitoring protocols and what options are available. A wide variety of methods and tools are examined, including citizen science, bioindication, the role of taxonomy, drones and eDNA. The book concludes by examining policy and education strategies for insect conservation in Section VI. The chapters discuss key issues around social and policy strategies and conservation legislation for ensuring the long-term protection of insects.

This book is essential reading for students and scholars of biodiversity conservation and entomology as well as professionals and policymakers involved in conservation looking for real-world solutions to the threats facing insects across the globe.

A series of original papers and reviews dealing with the peculiarities of island insects and their conservation in many parts of the world. Contributions to this special issue of Journal of Insect Conservation range from biogeographical analyses and ecological features of island insects and their evolution to the variety of concerns for their wellbeing, and practical conservation through a variety of, sometimes novel, approaches. They provide a valuable and up-to-date resource for entomologists and conservation practitioners.

Australia’s varied grasslands have suffered massive losses and changes since European settlement, and those changes continue under increasingly intensive human pressures for development and agricultural production. The values of native grasslands for conservation of endemic native biodiversity, both flora and fauna, have led to strong interests in the protection of remaining fragments, especially near urban centres, and documentation of the insects and other inhabitants of grasslands spanning tropical to cool temperate parts of the country. Attention to conservation of grassland insects in Australia is relatively recent, but it is increasingly apparent that grasslands harbour many localised and ecologically specialised endemic species.  Their conservation necessarily advances from very incomplete documentation, and draws heavily on lessons from the far better-documented grasslands elsewhere, most notably in the northern hemisphere, and undertaken over far longer periods.From those cases, and the extensive background to grassland management to harmonise conservation with production and amenity values through honing use of processes such as grazing, mowing and fire, the needs and priorities for Australia can become clearer, together with needs for grassland restoration at a variety of scales.

This book is a broad overview of conservation needs of grassland insects in Australia, drawing on the background provided elsewhere in the world on the responses to disturbances, and the  ecological importance, of some key insect groups (notably Orthoptera, Hemiptera and Lepidoptera) to suggest how insect conservation in native, pastoral and urban grasslands may be advanced.  The substantial references given for each chapter facilitate entry for non-entomologist grassland managers and stewards to appreciate the diversity and importance of Australia’s grassland insects, their vulnerabilities to changes, and the possibilities for conserving them and the wider ecological roles in which they participate. 

The first broad overview of conservation needs of Australia’s largely endemic freshwater insects, drawing on examples and information from many parts of the world to illustrate and develop needs and practical prospects for conservation in inland water environments. The wide variety of those environments in Australia and their diverse insect inhabitants – many of them highly localised and ecologically specialised and vulnerable - and threats to them is illustrated.  Case histories demonstrate the different aspects of practical conservation management that may be possible in different contexts, and numerous references facilitate understanding by non-specialist readers and non-entomologist conservation managers and practitioners. 

Conservation interest in moths, by far the predominant components of Lepidoptera, lags far behind that for butterflies, for which conservation practice provides many well-established lessons for extension to their near relatives. The needs of moths are at least as great, but their greater richness and variety, and far poorer documentation of diversity and biology over much of the world contribute to this lack of attention. Australia’s rich moth fauna, largely endemic and of global interest, illustrates many of the problems of developing wider interest and support for moth conservation. Numerous species (perhaps half the total fauna) are undescribed, and many are ecological specialists in restricted and vulnerable environments over small parts of the continent. Establishing their conservation status and needs whilst accepting that foundation knowledge is highly incomplete and much species-focused conservation is impracticable provides complex problems in setting priorities, based largely on wider diversity and effective advocacy.  Most Australian vegetation systems, from grassland to forest and from sea-level to alpine zones, have been eroded in extent and quality since European settlement, resulting in massive habitat changes for native insects and to leave fragmented (and commonly degraded) remnants in which moths and others may persist. Recent surveys continue to increase recorded moth richness, reveal local faunal peculiarities, and indicate how assemblage changes may mirror wider environmental changes. This book is an overview of advances in documenting and interpreting moth diversity and ecology, to show how information from better-studied moth faunas can help in planning conservation of Australia’s moths through measures such as understanding the moths themselves by increased surveys and study, the factors influencing their diversity and wellbeing, and how such threats may be countered through increased coordinated conservation interest, commitment and management.

The fundamental ecological, cultural and economic roles of insects give them central importance in functioning of terrestrial and inland water ecosystems worldwide. Insect declines, from a variety of anthropogenic threats, erode these services and dictate the need for insect conservation, but the consequences of insect losses are poorly recognised. In Australia, insect conservation must proceed from a very uncertain and incomplete knowledge of insect identifications and diversity, and also from a generally poor public appreciation of their central ecological roles and relevance to human welfare and other biota. These impediments occupy much of this book, in which cases of insect conservation across the world are used to provide lessons for Australia, where a combination of large numbers of insect species and small numbers of entomologists and citizen participants necessitates clear appreciation of insect importance, and focussed conservation priorities. Low public sympathy and inadequate scientific information can hinder progress because uncertainty, imprecision and ignorance are difficult to explain to policymakers and funding agencies whose interest and support may be pivotal. Understanding and overcoming those impediments is a vital component of insect conservation.

This book is intended as an introduction to the needs, rationale and practice of insect conservation in Australia for students in conservation biology, managers and other concerned people who are not specialists in entomology, to whom the daunting variety and complexity of insect life may deter involvement, and for whom an Appendix aid to recognising insect orders is included. The text is based on conservation needs of Australia’s insects and shows how progress necessitates effective communication, clear priorities, and plans for action within a realistic and practical framework of aims and needs for practical conservation. A suggested ‘Agenda’ for advancing insect conservation in Australia encompasses many of these needs and activities.