Michael W. Strohbach

Synergies, Trade-offs, and Losses of Ecosystem Services in Urban Regions: an Integrated Multiscale Framework Applied to the Leipzig- Halle Region, Germany

Because we have entered the millennium of the cities, urban ecological research needs to account for the provisions ecosystem services provide to urban regions. In urban areas, ecosystem service assessment studies need to account for the complex land use patterns, which change over relatively short periods of time. We discuss an analytical framework for the spatial and temporal integration of different ecosystem services in an urban region to determine synergies, trade-offs and losses, and we employ a case study in Leipzig-Halle, Germany. The following five ecosystem services, which are of special importance for urban areas, were selected: local climate regulation, recreation potential, biodiversity potential, food supply, and above-ground carbon storage. These services were analyzed from 1990 to 2006. Our results identified only slight increases in urbanization (1% or 3 km²) and in mining restoration (-11 km²). However, the detected land use changes led to synergies with biodiversity and climate regulation of > 50% of the total area, whereas trade-offs of approximately 60% were detected between variables such as climate regulation and recreation. Finally, we address both the opportunities and the challenges that were encountered in the integration study, specifically with respect to the application in land use planning.

Birds and the city: urban biodiversity, land use, and socioeconomics.

We examined bird diversity in relation to land use and socioeconomic indicators in Leipzig, Germany. We used neighborhood diversity (ND) and bivariate correlation to show that the potential to experience biodiversity in a city is associated with population density, household income, unemployment, and urban green space. People living in urban districts with high socioeconomic status experience the highest species richness around their homes, whereas lower social status increases the chance of living in species-poor neighborhoods. High-status districts are located along forests, parks, and rivers that have a high quantity and quality of green space. However, green space in general does not guarantee high bird diversity. We conclude that bird diversity mirrors land use and socioeconomic patterns within the compact European city of Leipzig. Therefore, urban planning should focus on decreasing these patterns and protecting the remaining species-rich green spaces.

150 years of changes in bird life in Cambridge, Massachusetts from 1860 to 2012

Abstract The process of urbanization and its effects on birds has rarely been documented over long time periods. One exception is a bird count started in the 1860s, when the American ornithologist William Brewster first recorded all the bird species on his property in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since then, invasive species such as the House Sparrow (Passer domesticus) have been introduced, and the site transformed from an estate surrounded by farmland on the rural edge of the city to a residential neighborhood in the inner core of the Boston metropolitan area. We are fortunate to have additional bird species accounts from around 1900, 1940, 1950, and 1960. In 2012 we repeated the bird survey, thus expanding the time series to 150 years. The changes in the bird community over time have been profound and the data contain a wealth of “stories” about how different species and species guilds have coped. The transition from an agricultural to an urban but also more forested system is clearly visible in the records. Overall, species richness has declined from 26 species in the 1860s to just 12 in 2012. However, this is a slight increase from the low point in the 1960s, and there is evidence that some conditions for birds have improved in the last 50 years.

Space use by resident and transient coyotes in an urban–rural landscape mosaic

Abstract Context. Coyotes (Canis latrans) have adapted successfully to human landscape alteration in the past 150 years and in recent decades have successfully moved into urban areas. While this causes concern about human–wildlife conflicts, research also suggests that coyotes tend to avoid humans and human activity in urban areas. For improving management, a better understanding of space use by coyotes is needed. Aims. To study how coyote social behaviour influences fine-scale space use in urban areas we present results from an extensive, multi-year GPS telemetry study (2005–13). The study area in coastal Rhode Island is a mosaic of rural, suburban and urban land use and coyotes have only recently arrived. Methods. We differentiated between two social classes: residents (individuals that have established a territory; nu2009=u200924) and transients (individuals that have no territory; nu2009=u20097). Space use was analysed using mixed effect models and detailed land-cover data. Key results. Coyotes tended to select for agricultural and densely vegetated land cover and against land used for housing and commerce. Pasture and cropland were preferred by residents and avoided by transients, especially at night, indicating the role of agricultural land as prime foraging habitat. Both groups selected densely vegetated land cover for daytime shelter sites. Transients selected for densely vegetated land cover both day and night, indicating use for both shelter and foraging. Resident coyotes avoided high- and medium-density housing more than transients. Conclusions. We interpret land-cover selection by resident coyotes as indicative of coyote habitat preference, while transients more often occupied marginal habitats that probably do not reflect their preferences. Differences in land cover selection between residents and transients suggest that transients have a corollary strategy to avoid residents. Implications. With cover and food appearing to be important drivers of space use, coexistence strategies can build on controlling food resources as well as on the tendency of coyotes to avoid humans. Nevertheless, transients, having the need to avoid territorial resident coyotes as well, show a reduced aversion to land cover with high human activity, creating a higher potential for human–wildlife conflicts.

Carbon sequestration in shrinking cities – potential or a drop in the ocean?

Numerous cities in the industrialized world are loosing population – they are shrinking. Concerning carbon storage, shrinking cities are of particular interest: they have a high potential for urban renewal and related new green space as brownfields are abundant; pressure from development is also low. In this paper, we present a study on the carbon sequestration potential of two urban renewal projects in the cities of Leipzig and Halle in eastern Germany. Results show that both tree planting and biofuel production have a similar carbon mitigation effect and thus are good options for urban renewal. However, compared to overall emissions, the mitigation effect is limited.

Urban Wildlife Science in Coupled Human–Natural Systems

Coupled human and natural systems (CHANS) are defined as systems in which human and natural components interact. Nowhere is this coupling as intense as in cities, and therefore, urban wildlife is distinguished from other wildlife by the increased level of interaction with people and human modified environments. Efforts to understand urban wildlife ecology therefore require explicit consideration of interactions and feedback between social and natural systems. In this chapter, we describe the dominant models developed for conceptualizing CHANS, and explain key principles for urban wildlife science that emerge from a perspective rooted in CHANS.