Global_assessment_urban_ecology_reptiles.xlsx

Global urban expansion has multiple impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. Still, urban centers may play an important role in the conservation of reptiles, an undersampled, megadiverse, and unevenly distributed group especially vulnerable to anthropogenic impacts. However, major gaps in research on urban ecology of reptiles and species responses to urbanisation persist, which may limit our capacity to guide suitable conservation policies. We conducted a global systematic literature review to evaluate biogeographic, taxonomic and ecological biases on urban ecology of reptiles, and ultimately to detect major gaps and steer future sampling efforts. We used the Web of Science (WOS) to conduct an exhaustive search of scientific articles on urban ecology of reptiles published worldwide until December 2019. The search was conducted using the following keywords only in english “((herpet* OR rept* OR squamat* OR crocodile* OR snake* OR lizard* OR turtle*) AND (urban* OR cit* OR antrop*))”. This search resulted in a database of 1.258 publications that included both native and exotic species. Because our goal was to evaluate trends, biases and gaps in urban ecology of reptiles, we only selected studies that focused on ecological responses of wild reptile species in urban areas. We exclusively incorporated reptiles to our database regardless whether the study covered other taxonomic groups (e.g., birds, mammals). Review papers and studies dealing on domestic (reptile pets) and/or commercial species (food or medicinal focus), as well as those conducted only in agricultural and other rural areas located outside suburban and urban environments were also excluded. Studies on populations of domesticated species that have returned to feral state after release or escape, were also included.After selection criteria, our database ultimately comprised the following items: (1) year of the publication of the study; (2) country(ies) where study was conducted; (3) geographic coordinates and name (i.e., town, city) of the study location(s); (4) taxa involved in the study (orders: Rhynchocephalia, Squamata, Testudines, and Crocodylia; suborder only for Squamata: Lacertilia, Serpentes, and Amphisbaenia; and species). We used the classification of taxonomic groups based on The Tree of Life (http://tolweb.org/tree/; Maddison et al. 2007) and species were checked following The Reptile Database (Uetz et al. 2020). Taxa identified only at the genus level were recorded as <i>Genus</i> sp. (e.g., <i>Podarcis</i>, <i>Podarcis</i> sp., <i>Podarcis</i> spp., <i>Podarcis</i> sp. 1, <i>Podarcis</i> sp. 2 were all included as <i>Podarcis</i> sp.), whereas subspecies, varieties, forms, and species not fully identified with a proper specific epithet were included under the corresponding binomial species name (e.g., <i>Podarcis </i><i>muralis</i> ssp. <i>muralis</i>, <i>P.</i> aff. <i>muralis</i>, and <i>P.</i> cf. <i>muralis</i> were all recorded as <i>Podarcis </i><i>muralis</i>); (5) if the studied species was native or exotic; and (6) research topic(s), used as indicators of ecological bias, following Magle et al. (2012): animal behaviour (e.g. diet preferences, dispersal, habitat selection, home range, mating behaviour), community ecology (interactions between two or more species), conservation (wildlife preservation and conservation status), human-reptile conflict (situations where encounters of humans and wild reptiles end up causing damage to some of the parties such as injuries, death, and/or economic loss), landscape ecology (landscape-level processes such as connectivity, edge effect or land cover use), population ecology (individual- and population-level dynamics such as abundance, diversity, richness, and reproduction), wildlife management (active wildlife management, which includes population control, relocation, sharpshooting, and sterilization), and reptile health (studies that address any health assessment as contaminations, parasite load and diseases, or metabolism). Some studies reported data from multiple species, several biological responses associated with the considered research topics, and different countries and/or biomes. Each report within a study between a given species and a specific research topic was termed a case, the unit of our database. Some articles conducted international or intercontinental studies including more than one biome, and species with wide distribution area and/or introduced in other countries were occasionally studied in multiple biomes (e.g., <i>Podarcis muralis</i>). Therefore, we included each report between a given article and a specific biome and, within an article, between a particular biome and a single species. Consequently, the total number of studies (n = 288) does not correspond to the number of articles (n = 278) in our database and, similarly, the number of studied species across biomes (n = 669) does not correspond with the total number of species (n = 493) recorded in our database.

全球城市扩张对生物多样性与生态系统功能存在多重影响。然而，城市中心或许在爬行动物（Reptiles）保护中发挥着重要作用——爬行动物是一类采样不足、物种多样性极高且分布极不均衡的类群，尤其易受人为活动干扰。
当前爬行动物城市生态学研究以及物种对城市化的响应研究仍存在重大空白，这可能限制我们制定适宜保护政策的能力。为此，我们开展了一项全球系统性文献综述，以评估爬行动物城市生态学研究中的生物地理、分类学与生态学偏差，并最终识别核心研究空白，指导未来的采样工作。
我们以Web of Science (WOS) 为检索平台，对2019年12月前全球范围内发表的爬行动物城市生态学相关学术论文进行了全面检索。检索仅使用英文关键词："((herpet* OR rept* OR squamat* OR crocodile* OR snake* OR lizard* OR turtle*) AND (urban* OR cit* OR antrop*))"。本次检索共得到1258篇涉及本土与外来物种的文献。
鉴于我们的研究目标是评估爬行动物城市生态学研究的趋势、偏差与空白，我们仅筛选聚焦于野生爬行动物物种在城市区域内的生态响应的研究。无论研究是否涵盖其他分类类群（如鸟类、哺乳类），我们均将爬行动物纳入数据库。我们同时排除了综述类文献，以及针对家养（宠物爬行动物）和/或商业物种（以食用或药用为目的）的研究，还有仅在郊区与城市环境之外的农业区或其他农村区域开展的研究。对于因逃逸或放生重返野生状态的家养爬行动物种群的研究，我们则予以纳入。
经过筛选标准处理后，我们的数据库最终包含以下6类信息：(1) 研究发表年份；(2) 研究开展的国家/地区；(3) 研究地点的地理坐标与名称（即城镇、城市名）；(4) 研究涉及的类群：包括喙头蜥目（Rhynchocephalia）、有鳞目（Squamata）、龟鳖目（Testudines）与鳄目（Crocodylia）；其中有鳞目可进一步划分为蜥蜴亚目（Lacertilia）、蛇亚目（Serpentes）与蚓蜥亚目（Amphisbaenia）；以及具体物种。我们采用《生命之树》（The Tree of Life，http://tolweb.org/tree/; Maddison et al. 2007）的分类体系对类群进行归类，并参照《爬行动物数据库》（Uetz et al. 2020）对物种信息进行核验。仅鉴定至属级水平的类群，将记录为*Genus* sp.（例如，*Podarcis*、*Podarcis* sp.、*Podarcis* spp.、*Podarcis* sp. 1与*Podarcis* sp. 2均归类为*Podarcis* sp.）；而亚种、变种、型以及未获得完整学名的物种，将归入对应的二项式物种名中（例如，*Podarcis muralis* ssp. *muralis*、*P.* aff. *muralis*与*P.* cf. *muralis*均记录为*Podarcis muralis*）；(5) 研究物种为本土物种还是外来物种；(6) 研究主题：参照Magle等人（2012）的分类标准，作为生态学偏差的指示指标，具体包括：动物行为（如食性偏好、扩散、生境选择、家域、交配行为）、群落生态学（两个及以上物种间的相互作用）、保护生物学（野生动物保护与保护现状）、人-爬行动物冲突（人类与野生爬行动物的相遇导致双方出现受伤、死亡或经济损失的情形）、景观生态学（景观尺度的过程，如连通性、边缘效应或土地覆盖利用）、种群生态学（个体与种群水平的动态，如丰度、多样性、物种丰富度与繁殖）、野生动物管理（主动的野生动物管理措施，包括种群控制、迁地保护、射杀与绝育）以及爬行动物健康（针对污染物、寄生虫负荷与疾病等健康评估，或代谢相关研究）。
部分研究报告了多个物种的数据、与研究主题相关的多种生物学响应，以及来自不同国家和/或生物群区的结果。某一研究中针对特定物种与特定研究主题的每份报告，被定义为一个“案例”，即本数据库的分析单元。部分文献开展了跨国家或跨洲际的研究，涵盖多个生物群区；而分布范围广泛和/或被引入其他国家的物种，偶尔会在多个生物群区中被研究（例如*Podarcis muralis*）。因此，我们会纳入某篇文献针对特定生物群区的每份报告，以及某篇文献中针对特定生物群区与单个物种的报告。由此可见，本数据库中的研究总数（n=288）与文献总数（n=278）并不一致；同理，跨生物群区的研究物种数（n=669）与数据库中记录的总物种数（n=493）也不匹配。