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Populations of many migratory taxa have been declining over recent decades. Although protected areas are a cornerstone for conservation, their role in protecting migratory species can be incomplete due to the dynamic distributions of these species. Here, we use a pan-European citizen science bird occurrence dataset (EurobirdPortal) with Spatiotemporal Exploratory Modelling to assess how the weekly distributions of 30 passerine and near passerine species overlap with protected areas in Europe and compare this to range adjusted policy protection targets.

Many people are familiar with the idea of a protected area—land or water areas set aside and kept as natural as possible, such as national parks and nature reserves. Protected areas are one of the most well-established conservation tools, playing a crucial role in protecting biodiversity. However, they often require significant political will, funding, and enforcement and do not always account for lands and waters that are effectively conserved outside of formal protection.

Predicting coral bleaching events has been key to reef conservation management efforts. Current satellite-based bleaching prediction tools offer effective regional-scale alerts of bleaching risk, but lack reliability at the reef-scale. Bleaching models focus on predicted heat exposure during summer, omitting critical factors that influence heat stress responses and the subsequent coral reef community bleaching severity. The IPCC framework however assesses the susceptibility of a system to be harmed by climate change based on exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity.

Coastal wetlands, including tidal marshes, mangrove forests and tidal flats, support the livelihoods of millions of people. Understanding the resilience of coastal wetlands to the increasing number and intensity of anthropogenic threats (such as habitat conversion, pollution, fishing and climate change) can inform what conservation actions will be effective. In this Review, we synthesize anthropogenic threats to coastal wetlands and their resilience through the lens of scale.

UNESCO biosphere reserves serve as learning areas for sustainable development, where preserving ecosystem functionality is an imperative. However, this critical assumption has yet to be thoroughly examined. To address this knowledge gap, we investigated differences in satellite-derived proxies of ecosystem functions in forests between inside and surrounding areas of biosphere reserves, globally.

Ecosystem-based marine spatial planning is an approach to managing maritime activities while ensuring human well-being and biodiversity conservation as key pillars for sustainable development. Here, we use a comprehensive literature review and a co-development process with experts to build an assessment framework and tool that integrates the fundamental principles of an ecosystem approach to management and translates them into specific actions to be undertaken during planning processes.

Knowledge of the habitat use and migration patterns of large sharks is important for assessing the effectiveness of large predator Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), vulnerability to fisheries and environmental influences, and management of shark–human interactions. Here we compare movement, reef-fidelity, and ocean migration for tiger sharks, Galeocerdo cuvier, across the Coral Sea, with an emphasis on New Caledonia.

Engaging youth in early and sustained conservation education has important implications for promoting positive attitudes and behaviors in those who will become the future of conservation and management. Toward this goal, visual narratives (comic books, graphic novels) are an increasingly popular method used by conservation scientists to educate young people due to their approachable use of art and narrative storytelling. However, no studies have directly assessed how visual narratives compare with more traditional forms of conservation education for youth.