Thomas Evans

Biodiversity and Ecology

UCL

UCL

Invasive alien species (IAS) can severely damage the environment, and are the second most significant cause of species extinction risk worldwide. However, the impacts of IAS vary, and there is a great deal of uncertainty regarding the mechanisms and processes that lead to invasions with impact, and the most appropriate measures to adopt in order to identify and quantify those impacts. This uncertainty means that we are often unable confidently to determine the most appropriate course of action to predict and manage alien invasions, and so proposed conservation interventions may be ineffective and unnecessarily costly. I will use a standardised, unified methodology to quantify and categorise the impacts of IAS, using alien birds as a model taxon. In so doing, I will generate the first-ever global classification of alien bird species in terms of the severity of their environmental impacts. I will then use the data generated to assess spatial and taxonomic variation in the extent of alien bird impacts, and to test the characteristics of alien birds that determine this variation. This will enable recommendations to be made regarding future approaches to identify and manage IAS.

• Evans, T., Pigot, A., Kumschick, S., Şekercioğlu, Ç. H., & Blackburn, T. M. (2018) Determinants of data deficiency in the impacts of alien bird species Ecography DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.03232
• Evans, T, Kumschick, S, Şekercioğlu, ÇH, Blackburn, TM. (2018) Identifying the factors that determine the severity and type of alien bird impacts Divers Distrib DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ddi.12721

New Protocol Helps Identify and Categorise Environmental Impacts of Alien Species, Centre of Excellence for Invasion Biology