Metapopulation dynamics of Roseate Terns: sources, sinks and implications for conservation management decisions

1. Habitat management to restore or create breeding sites may allow metapopulations to increase in size and reduce the risk of demographic stochasticity or disasters causing metapopulation extinction. However, if newly restored or created sites are of low quality, they may act as sinks that draw individuals away from better quality sites to the detriment of metapopulation size.
2. Following intensive conservation effort, the metapopulation of roseate tern (Sterna dougallii) in NW Europe is recovering from a large crash in numbers, but most former colonies remain unoccupied and hence are potential targets for restoration. To inform conservation efforts, we studied the dynamics of this metapopulation with a multistate integrated population model to assess each of the three main colonies for important demographic contributors to population growth rate, source/sink status and possible density dependence.
3. All three study colonies are managed for roseate terns (and other tern species) in...

1. 通过生境管理修复或创建繁殖栖息地，可使集合种群（metapopulation）的规模得以扩张，并降低因种群统计随机性或灾难事件导致集合种群灭绝的风险。然而，若新修复或新建的栖息地质量不佳，则可能沦为汇生境，将个体从优质栖息地吸引至此，最终损害集合种群的整体规模。
2. 经过高强度的保护干预，西北欧地区的粉红燕鸥（Sterna dougallii）集合种群正从种群数量骤降的状态中逐步恢复，但绝大多数原繁殖群仍未被占据，因此具备修复潜力。为给保护工作提供科学依据，本研究采用多状态整合种群模型对该集合种群的动态开展分析，以评估三个主要繁殖群各自对种群增长率具有关键影响的种群统计参数、源/汇生境状态，以及潜在的密度制约效应。
3. 本次研究的三个繁殖群均针对粉红燕鸥（及其他燕鸥类群）开展管理，在……