Peter Werner Institute for Housing and Environment Research institution of the State of Hesse and the City of Darmstadt

New Challenges for Urban Biodiversity Strategies Peter Werner Institute for Housing and Environment Research institution of the State of Hesse and the City of Darmstadt URBIO Workshop 2013 Global Research Agenda for Urban Biodiversity, Ecosystem Services and Design 21-23 July 2013 in Erfurt 1

Structure 1. Knowledge of biodiversity in urban areas 2. Who influences the biodiversity in the cities? 3. Urban biodiversity a topic for citizen science? 4. Conclusion 2

1. Knowledge Around two thirds of scientific publications with respect to nature conservation do not consider practical problems of conservation projects and activities (Knight et al. 2008). Not helpful for an academic career Only 2 % of practitioners in nature conservation projects in United Kingdom use primarily scientific publications (Sunderland et al. 2009). The publications are not helpful for complex practices

1. Knowledge number of answers (n=124) indicator exact estim. unknown vascular plants 53 37 28 birds 77 27 16 butterflies 55 26 33 mammals (no bats) 5 7 bats 25 1 amphibians 61 4 reptiles 24 7 fish 9 1 grasshoppers 9 3 dragonflies 11 3 street trees 66 46 7 green area/person 79 27 17 nature cons. area 100 20 6

1. Knowledge 45,0 40,0 35,0 % of all recorded taxa 30,0 25,0 20,0 15,0 10,0 Evans (2010) Luck (2007) capital award 5,0 0,0

1. Knowledge n species 1400 Species-area-relations of European cities 1200 1000 800 plants (McKinney 2008) 600 400 200 birds 0,5 1 1,5 2 2,5 3 log km² butterflies (own data, DUH) Butterfly richness was positively correlated with avian richness and total plant richness, but no correlation existed between avian and plant richness. (Dallimer et al. 2012) Cross-taxonomic studies are needed to better understand the different drivers of urban biodiversity. (Shwartz et al. 2013)

1. Knowledge New project planned (start 01 Jan 2014): Urban Green Infrastructure for Biodiversity - Integrated Strategies and Activites for Urban Biodiversity Implementation monitoring system Filtering Regional species pool, urban matrix Green infrastructure and ecosystem services Top-down and bottom-up strategies Citizen science Partners: Leibniz Institute of Ecological Urban and Regional Development (Dresden), Deutsche Umwelthilfe (Radolfzell), City of Bielefeld, City of Heidelberg

1. Knowledge Monitoring system Learning from other areas (e. g. in Germany around 1,000 cities and towns have carried out local energy and carbon dioxid balances as a basis for integrated climate protection strategies); Comparable in space (e. g. German guidelines for urban biotope mappings, City Biodiversity Index); Comparable in time - history of areas and time lack, too many onetime-only investigations, turn over rates, number of species and their abundances (e. g. CBI, Bavarian urban biotope mapping).

1. Knowledge Filtering system (Aronson et al. in review) Climate change the future is different from the present

1. Knowledge embedded city (city region) urban matrix green patches

1. Knowledge 1.600 Species-area curve (data representing 90 cities from Germany, Poland, Slovakia and France) 1.400 1.200 number of plant species 1.000 800 600 400 200 y = 368,4x - 49,79 R² = 0,356 0 0,00 0,50 1,00 1,50 2,00 2,50 3,00 3,50 municipality area in log10 km² Pysek 1998, IUCN and DUH 2010 and own data

1. Knowledge 1600 Plant species-area-relation of cities from Southern Europe (n = 14) 1400 1200 n plant species 1000 800 600 400 200 0 y = -163,6x + 1301, R² = 0,045 1,5 1,7 1,9 2,1 2,3 2,5 2,7 2,9 3,1 3,3 urban area log km²

2. Impact New project planned (start 01 Jan 2014): Urban Green Infrastructure for Biodiversity - Integrated Strategies and Activites for Urban Biodiversity Implementation monitoring system Filtering Regional species pool, urban matrix Green infrastructure and ecosystem services Top-down and bottom-up strategies Citizen science Partners: Leibniz Institute of Ecological Urban and Regional Development (Dresden), Deutsche Umwelthilfe (Radolfzell), City of Bielefeld, City of Heidelberg

2. Impact Rgeulation of biodiversity by green infrastructure Habitat Matrix Region

2. Impact * * HOAs = homeowners associations (Walker et al. 2009)

2. Impact More than 80 % of the urban area of San Francisco are private (Connor et al. 2002) In the USA 75% of the threatened and endangered species are on private land (Cornell Lab of Ornithology) Regionalverband Frankfurt/Rhein-Main The local governments of German cities own less than 50 % of the municipality area (Behrens o. J., Epping 1977)

2. Impact immediate impact mediate impact

2. Impact Housing associations Darmstadt Bauverein AG: 11,000 trees 11 km hedge rows 33 ha lawns Home owners Business owners Germany: around 13 millions owner occupiers in towns 2/3 of the built-up areas are used by them. Darmstadt, Merck: 30 % of the business site is green New skills: Managing people not animals and plants

3. Citizen Science New project planned (start 01 Jan 2014): Urban Green Infrastructure for Biodiversity - Integrated Strategies and Activites for Urban Biodiversity Implementation monitoring system Filtering Regional species pool, urban matrix Green infrastructure and ecosystem services Top-down and bottom-up strategies Citizen science Partners: Leibniz Institute of Ecological Urban and Regional Development (Dresden), Deutsche Umwelthilfe (Radolfzell), City of Bielefeld, City of Heidelberg

3. Citizen Science Private persons as data collectors Various studies highlight the value of surveying private landowners as a means of detecting species presence/ absence in numerous locations, inaccessible for public data collectors, and the important role landowners can play in providing species occurrence information (Lepczyk 2005). In the USA monitoring projects have been established tailored to private landowners, particularly farmers.

3. Citizen Science Bird monitoring (DDA) Butterfly monitoring (UFZ) Banded snails (Year of Darwin 2009) Bird Race (NABU) BioBlitz (z. B. Montpelier/USA)

3. Citizen Science

4. Conclusion Keep the research-implementation gap as close as possible (e. g. CONTUREC, Bündnis der Kommunen). Include new knowledge in biodiversity strategies (e. g. filtering, matrix concept). Include private activities in the strategies (e. g. private landowners). Support citizens to collect data about local biodiversity (e. g. citizen science). Learning from other environmental strategies to improve biodiversity strategies (e. g. climate protection strategies).

Thank you very much for your attention!