Challenges and a call to action for protecting European red wood ants

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F60076658%3A12520%2F22%3A43905239" target="_blank" >RIV/60076658:12520/22:43905239 - isvavai.cz</a>

Alternative codes found

RIV/00216208:11310/22:10453714

Result on the web

<a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13959" target="_blank" >https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13959</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13959" target="_blank" >10.1111/cobi.13959</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Challenges and a call to action for protecting European red wood ants

Original language description

Red wood ants (RWAs) are a group of keystone species widespread in temperate and boreal forests of the Northern Hemisphere. Despite this, there is increasing evidence of local declines and extinctions. We reviewed the current protection status of RWAs throughout Europe and their International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) threat classification. Only some RWA species have been assessed at a global scale, and not all national red lists of the countries where RWAs are present include these species. Different assessment criteria, inventory approaches, and risk categories are used in different countries, and data deficiency is frequent. Legislative protection is even more complex, with some countries protecting RWAs implicitly together with the wildlife fauna and others explicitly protecting the whole group or particular species. This complexity often occurs within countries, for example, in Italy, where, outside of the Alps, only the introduced species are protected, whereas the native species, which are in decline, are not. Therefore, an international, coordinated framework is needed for the protection of RWAs. This first requires that the conservation target should be defined. Due to the similar morphology, complex taxonomy, and frequent hybridization, protecting the entire RWA group seems a more efficient strategy than protecting single species, although with a distinction between autochthonous and introduced species. Second, an update of the current distribution of RWA species is needed throughout Europe. Third, a protection law cannot be effective without the collaboration of forest managers, whose activity influences RWA habitat. Finally, RWA mounds offer a peculiar microhabitat, hosting a multitude of taxa, some of which are obligate myrmecophilous species on the IUCN Red List. Therefore, RWAs&apos; role as umbrella species could facilitate their protection if they are considered not only as target species but also as providers of species-rich microhabitats.

Czech name

—

Czech description

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Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

—

OECD FORD branch

10618 - Ecology

Project

—

Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2022

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Conservation Biology

ISSN

0888-8892

e-ISSN

1523-1739

Volume of the periodical

36

Issue of the periodical within the volume

6

Country of publishing house

US - UNITED STATES

Number of pages

8

Pages from-to

nestrankovano

UT code for WoS article

000836278700001

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85135416701