Biology subjects

Hartel, T.

Publications and source records attributed to Hartel, T..

4 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2020

Holistic assessment of large old trees: a framework and its application for Romania

Large old trees are keystone ecological structures and have exceptional sociocultural values. Still, holistic approaches to national assessments of large old trees are scarse in the scientific literature. Here we propose and apply a holistic framework to understand the distribution of large old trees, the formal regulations targeting the conservation of large old trees and the ways large old trees are present in the popular news in Romania. There were 4032 large old tree records in Romania most of the records being concentrated in the Central and North-Western part of Romania. The number of tree records decreases with the decreasing terrain accessibility. Almost 50% of the large old tree records are in areas not covered by nature conservation regulations and 2/3 of the terrestrial protected areas have no open access large old tree records, so far. We identified five formal regulations which could be relevant for large old tree conservation in Romania, however, only two of these explicitly targets large old trees. The lack of knowledge and interest, the lack of expertize, institutional capacity, vested interests (corruption) and inconsistencies within the regulations are the major barriers in the formal protection of large old trees. We also identified several opportunities for the local initiatives to protect large old trees, based on the current legislative frameworks. We identified 259 internet news targeting large old trees in Romania which reveals a wide range of values and concerns associated to large old trees at the level of the local communities. While discussing our results we highlight the benefits of a wider adoption of our approach for science, decision making and local initiatives to save large old trees.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2020

Governance networks around grasslands with contrasting management history

Romanian grasslands have high nature value, being among the most important biodiversity hotspots at the European level. The European Union Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) contradicts the Biodiversity Strategy to 2020 objective by hindering coordinated grassland governance and collaboration among the involved actors. At the European level, few attempts have been made in creating conceptual strategies for implementing conservation measures in a multi-actor and multi-scale governance setting. Our paper focuses on a comparative network analysis of grassland landscape governance of three Romanian regions (Iron Gates Natural Park - SW; Sighisoara - Tarnava Mare - center; and Dobrogea - SE), representatives for grassland management in mountain and lowland settings. We investigated the structural characteristics of one-mode directed grassland governance networks in the three protected areas (standard cohesion and reciprocity metrics and exponential random graph models), the position of institutions participating in networks (node-level centrality metrics), and the perception of CAP influence on grassland governance by farmers benefiting of CAP agri-environmental payments. In Sighisoara, grasslands governance has been centralized but biodiversity-friendly, while in Iron Gates, grasslands were traditionally managed through a decentralized, community-level system, and this type of governance continues to date. Whereas for Dobrogeas grasslands, the governance was performed in an intensive, centralized state-run management regime during the communist time and by large landowners after the transition period ended. Our findings illustrate the structure of the three governance networks and dissimilar patterns of collaboration, indicating distinct particularities to be considered when exploring barriers to and options for successful governance in traditionally managed grasslands in the context of CAP measures-driven management.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2019

Temporary pond loss as a result of pasture abandonment: exploring the social-ecological drivers and consequences on amphibians

Amphibian conservation in farming landscapes should address two challenges. First, to understand the relationship between landuse and amphibian habitat quality and second, to understand and support of the capacity of the local communities to continue those farming practices which supports amphibian friendly habitats. While the first challenge is addressed by several studies, there is virtually no study addressing the socio-economic drivers of landuse change. The major aim of this study to fill this knowledge gap by (i) documenting the temporary pond loss in 10 years in a traditionally managed pasture as a result of land abandonment and (ii) exploring the socio-economic and environmental drivers of abandonment. The results show a dramatic increase of scrub cover in the study area as a result of land abandonment. The formation of temporary ponds was negatively influenced by the increase of scrub cover in the vicinity of ponds. There were no differences between the amphibian species assemblages nor the species richness between the lost- and persisting ponds. The social component of the research highlights possible maladaptive paths in pasture management reinforced by the village depopulation, wrong interpretation of nature protection law by officials, scrub encroachment caused decrease in pasture quality and the demotivation of locals to restart traditional grazing. Conservation efforts in traditional farming landscapes facing land abandonment should (i) target the maximization of the quality of the remaining ponds for amphibians and (ii) should support reviving traditional farming practices within the local community.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2018

Who is researching biodiversity hotspots in Eastern Europe? A case study on grasslands from Romania

Farming landscapes of Europe are vital arenas for social-ecological sustainability because of their significant coverage and potential to integrate food production with biodiversity conservation. Knowledge gathered by scientific research is a critical ingredient for developing and implementing socio-economically and ecologically sustainable grassland management strategies for grasslands. The quality of scientific knowledge and its potential to address grasslands as complex social-ecological systems is strongly dependent on the creativity and scientific ambition of the researcher, but also on the network (from academic and non-academic sectors) around the researcher. The goal of this paper is to map the research network around Romanias grasslands. These systems have exceptional socio-cultural and economic values and are between the most biodiverse ecosystems of the world. Considering the multiple threats to these grasslands, it is an urgent need to understand the existing scientific knowledge profile around these systems. This paper aims at using bibliometrics analysis, a well-developed scientific domain that envisages network theory to analyze relationships between affiliations network, co-authorship network, and co-word analysis. The number of studies targeting grassland management in Romania is increasing mainly thanks to international involvement. However, the management of the grasslands is still deficient and the contribution of science to the process is virtually absent. The subject of research is mainly related to the biological and ecological characteristics of grasslands, a notable absence from internationally visible research being the management of grasslands, especially in the context of EU Common Agricultural Policies. To increase scientific performance, and better inform EU and local policies on grassland management, Romanian researchers should better capitalize on international collaborations and local academic leaders. Our findings can be used to identify research gaps and to improve collaboration and knowledge exchange between practitioners, scientists, policy makers, and stakeholders.

scientific communication and education↗