April 2013
Conservation Leadership Programme e-Newsletter
Welcome 2013 CLP Teams!
Executive Manager's Message

The Conservation Leadership Programme extends our congratulations and a very warm welcome to the recipients of 2013 Conservation Awards! After another rigorous round of reviews by expert staff and our faithful judges, we welcome 24 new teams to our alumni network and welcome back an additional four CLP teams who were awarded continuation funding.

This year, we have awarded $470,000 to build the capacity of early career conservationists in 22 countries. The CLP management team looks forward to engaging with and supporting our grant winners in the coming months and to meeting a representative from each team at our two-week international training in Canada this June.    

With the need for conservation funding as great as ever, the CLP continuously tries to extend our reach to countries which have not yet received CLP support. This year, we are delighted to include five new countries to our network - Afghanistan, Bhutan, Cape Verde, Republic of Maldova and Samoa. We hope these projects pave the way for expanded CLP support in these countries.

While our Future Conservationist Awards jump start conservation on the ground, long-term professional development and conservation achievements are made possible through our follow-up awards. This year, three teams have secured a $25,000 grant for projects focusing on: amphibian research in Ghana, human-crane conflict in Zimbabwe, and protection of red-siskins in Guyana.

A CLP team in Turkey has won our highest award – a $50,000 grant to improve community-based conservation of Lake Kuyucuk, a Ramsar Site. We have great expectations for all of our teams, and our follow-up teams in particular, which have demonstrated the commitment and drive to make a difference in the long-term.

As we welcome new teams to our network, we are proud of the ongoing accomplishments of CLP alumni supported in previous years. I hope you enjoy this edition of the CLP newsletter which showcases alumni publications, conservation success stories, alumni professional development and more. 

Robyn Dalzen
CLP Director

BACK TO TOP
Where Are They Now?

During a recent trip to Colombia the CLP was reunited with Dr Nicolas Urbina-Cardona, CLP alumnus and Director of the Bachelor Programme in Ecology, at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogota. We learnt that as well as being a prolific author, researcher, advisor and family man, he also plays blistering solos in a local heavy metal band. Cranking it up to eleven, take it away, Dr Urbina!

BACK TO TOP
Tales From Another Land

Through its Learning Exchange Programme, the CLP offers alumni the unique opportunity to visit different project sites and receive mentoring from other alumni or CLP partner staff. In their own words, two CLP alumni write about their recent learning exchange trips to Brazil and Cambodia. Read their stories!

BACK TO TOP
IN THIS ISSUE
Executive Manager's Message
Where Are They Now?
Tales From Another Land
2013 CLP Photo Contest
Alumni Accomplishments
Upcoming Events
Conservation in Action
Final Reports
Alumni Publications
Project Websites
2013 CLP Photo Contest

Congratulations to Alberto Campos, winner of the 2013 CLP Photo Contest on NING! The picture captures young Edmundo's amazement as he uses binoculars for the first time.

Alumni Accomplishments

Vera Voronova received a $40,000 grant from the GEF Small Grants Programme for an 18 month project on threats to birds from power lines in Kazakhstan.

Anyelet Valencia Aguilar received a scholarship from La Organización de los Estados Americanos to do her Masters degree in Brazil.

Matt Shirley was awarded the Castillo Prize for significant contributions to crocodile conservation globally at the 2012 Working Meeting of the IUCN/SSC Crocodile Specialist Group.

Read more!

Upcoming Events

9-14 June 2013: World Environmental Education Congress

19 June - 3 July 2013: CLP's Conservation Leadership & Management Training

19-22 June 2013: BirdLife International World Congress

23-27 June 2013: ATBC & OTS 50th Anniversary Meeting

4 July 2013: CLP Alumni Travel Grant deadline

21-25 July 2013: 26th International Congress for Conservation Biology

4 Oct 2013: CLP Alumni Travel Grant deadline

9-11 Oct 2013: Student Conference on Conservation Science - NY

Conservation in Action

Two New Salamanders in Colombia

 

Parrot Becomes Symbol of Pride

 

A Song for Cuban Plants

Notes From the Field

 

BACK TO TOP
Final Reports

Bat Count Philippines (2006)

Project Seabirds Argentina: Conservation Through Community Involvement (2007)

Alder Amazon Project: Conservation Through Borders; Argentina - Bolivia (2008)

Abundance of Mountain Tapir in Puracé National Park, Colombia (2009)

Community Awareness and Capacity Building for Endangered Turtle Conservation in northeast India (2010)

Impact of Electric Powerlines on Birds in Central Kazakhstan Steppe (2011)

Conserving Wild Goats in the Peramagroon and Barzan Mounains, Iraq (2011)

The Pinstripe Damba and Bihara Turtle: Endemic Freshwater Species Conservation in Madagascar (2011)

Read final report summaries

BACK TO TOP
Alumni Publications

Abraham, R. K., Pyron, R.A., Ansil, B.R., Zachariah, A., & Zachariah, A. (2013) Two novel genera and one new species of treefrog (Anura: Rhacophoridae) highlight cryptic diversity in the Western Ghats of India. Zootaxa 3640(2):  177-189.

Amphibian diversity in the Western Ghats-Sri Lanka biodiversity hotspot is extremely high, especially for such a geo-graphically restricted area. Frogs in particular dominate these assemblages, and the family Rhacophoridae is chief among these, with hundreds of endemic species. These taxa continue to be described at a rapid pace, and several groups have recently been found to represent unique evolutionary clades at the genus level. Here, we report DNA sequences, larval and breeding data for two species of rhacophorid treefrog (Polypedates bijui and a new, hitherto undescribed species)...

Acevedo, A.A., Wake, D.B., Marquez, R., Silva, K., Franco, R., Amezquita, A. (2013) Two New Species of Salamanders, Genus Bolitoglossa (Amphibia: Plethodontidae), from the Eastern Colombian Andes. Zootaxa 3609(1): 69-84.

The salamander fauna of Colombia is very poorly known, probably because most research efforts have been devoted to anurans during the last two decades. Here, we describe two new species of the genus Bolitoglossa (Eladinea) from the eastern flank of the Eastern Colombian Andes (Cordillera Oriental), near the border with Venezuela. Bolitoglossa tamaense sp. nov. is distributed between 2000 to 2700 m.a.s.l. and Bolitoglossa leandrae sp. nov. is distributed in the low-lands at about 600 m. The new species are diagnosed by a combination of molecular (16S rRNA sequences), coloration, body size, and morphometric (number of maxillary and vomerine teeth and differences in foot webbing) characters…

Castellanos-Galindo, G.A., & Krumme, U. (2013) Mangrove fish assemblages from data-sparse regions and the measurement of ecological equivalence: Comment on Sheaves (2012). Marine Ecology Progress Series 474: 299-302.

Global comparisons of the structure of faunal assemblages can provide relevant insights on the way how ecosystems function. These comparisons, however, should try to cover the whole variety of faunal assemblages in different regions of the world and use appropriate metrics. In this article we call the attention to some of these issues when analyzing the ecological equivalence of world mangrove fish assemblages. Accounting for these biases will help to better understand how mangrove ecosystems are structured and how these important ecosystems should be protected.
 

de la Peña-Domene, M., Martínez-Garza, C., & Howe, H.F. (2012) In press. Early recruitment dynamics in tropical restoration. Ecological Applications. doi: 10.1890/12-1728.1

Unassisted secondary succession in abandoned tropical pastures often results in species-poor forests of pioneer trees that may persist for decades. We characterize seedling recruitment rates of woody vegetation in planting treatments during the first 60 months of experimental restoration at Los Tuxtlas, Mexico. Recruitment of pioneers did not differ between control and planted plots. Later-successional recruits dispersed by animals accumulated > 10 times faster in planted than controls, with apparent acceleration after planted Cecropia obtusifolia and Ficus yoponensis first produced fleshy fruits. Our preliminary results over the first five years indicate that planted stands clearly accelerate succession through accumulation of later-successional trees dispersed by animals.

Prakash, V., Bishwakarma, M. C., Chaudhary, A., Cuthbert, R., Dave, R., Kulkarni, M., Kumar, S., Paudel, K., Ranade, S., Shringarpure, R. & Green, R. E. (2012) The population decline of Gyps vulture in India and Nepal has slowed since veterinary use of diclofenac was banned. PLoS One 7(11): e49118. Doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0049118

 Populations of three species of vultures declined in the Indian subcontinent by over 95% since the mid-1990s. Repeat surveys analysed to estimate recent population trends showed populations decline had slowed. The degree to which the decline in India has slowed is consistent with the expected effects on population trend of a measured change in the level of contamination of ungulate carcasses with the drug diclofenac, which is toxic to vultures, following a ban on its veterinary use in 2006. Elimination of diclofenac from the vultures’ food supply is incomplete, so further efforts are required to implement the ban.

Santos-Barrera, G. & Urbina-Cardona, N. (2011) The role of the matrix-edge dynamics of amphibian conservation in tropical montane fragmented landscapes. Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad 82: 679-687.

Edge effects play a key role in forest dynamics in which the context of the anthropogenic matrix has a great influence on fragment connectivity and function. The study of the interaction between edge and matrix effects in nature is essential to understand and promote the colonization of some functional groups in managed ecosystems. We studied the dynamics of 7 species of frogs and salamanders occurring in 8 ecotones of tropical montane cloud forest (TMCF) which interact with adjacent managed areas of coffee and corn plantations in Guerrero, southern Mexico. A survey effort of 196 man/hours along 72 transects detected 58 individuals of 7 amphibian species and 12 environmental and structural variables were measured. The diversity and abundance of amphibians in the forest mostly depended on the matrix context adjacent to the forest patches…

See a full list of recent alumni publications

BACK TO TOP
Project Websites

Association for the Conservation of Biodiversity in Kazakhstan | Bat Census in Crimean Caves (Ukraine) | Birds-Indonesia | Community-based Conservation of Lake Kuyucuk, Kars (Turkey) | Community Centered Conservation (C3 - Comoros) | Community Forest Buffer (India) | Conservacion Argentina | Ecology and Conservation of the Chilean Dolphin | EcoLeague (Russia) | EcoMuseum (Kazakhstan) | Fundación Conserva (Colombia) | Fundación CEBio (Argentina) | Giant Otter Conservation (Bolivia) | Katala Foundation (Philippines) | Life on Chalk (Ukraine) | Mabuwaya Foundation (Philippines) | Macedonian Ecological Society | Madagasikara Voakajy | Marsh Deer Project (Argentina) | Mpingo Conservation Project (Tanzania) | Nature Conservation Foundation (India) | Nature Iraq | ProDelphinus (Peru) | Project Hapalopsittaca (Colombia) | Project Karumbé (Uruguay) | Sakhalin Salmon Initiative (Russia) | Seabirds Argentina | Sea to Shore Alliance (USA) | Soul of the Andes (Argentina) | Strizh Ecological Centre (Russia) | Turtle Conservation & Research Programme (India) | WildlifeDirect (Kenya)

BACK TO TOP
  
Home NING Facebook Send to a friend