Brief Communications

Using a 50 year time series of photos of cuckoo finch eggs and those of its host, prinia, the authors document that cuckoo eggs evolve towards prinia eggs, but progressive evolution of prinia eggs away from cuckoo eggs results in no detectible increase in mimetic fidelity.

Between 2000 and 2015, reclamation for cropland in China undermined gains in wildlife habitat and the ecosystem services of water retention, sandstorm prevention, carbon sequestration and soil retention by 113.8%, 63.4%, 52.5%, 29.0% and 10.2%, respectively.

Analysis of global eco-acoustic data shows that soundscape-based predictions of avian biodiversity do not generalize across datasets, but changes in soundscapes do consistently indicate changes in avian communities.

Multidecadal ground and remote-sensing observations of Northern Hemisphere forests show that, at the decadal scale, autumn senescence dates and total net carbon assimilation are positively related, despite a negative relationship at the annual scale. This suggests that acclimation relieves the leaf longevity constraints.

An analysis of 199 journals in ecology and evolution finds no link between policies mandating data sharing and the rate of article retraction or correction. The authors position this finding in a broader discussion of open data and code.

The authors use a theoretical model along with competition experiments between two aquatic plant species to show that phenotypic plasticity affects the outcome of competition.

In a meta-analysis comparing experimental versus observational studies of aboveground biomass responses to drought in grasslands, the authors show that effect sizes in experiments are 53% weaker than in observational studies, suggesting that experiments are underestimating drought responses.

Despite expectations that global anthropogenic pressures on species with communities may be size biased, this relationship has not been tested on a large scale. Here the authors use existing databases to show that larger species have not experienced more declines in abundance within their respective communities than small species.

By surveying ~5,000 citizens across five Asian countries/territories, the authors show that increased awareness of the COVID-19 pandemic reduced self-reported propensity to consume wildlife products. A behavioural intervention simulation also suggests that increasing awareness of zoonotic risks could reduce future wildlife consumption.

Maximum levels of global plant phylogenetic diversity capture more human benefits and at higher diversity levels than does random selection of taxa.

Via congruent observations in geological samples and pyrolysis experiments, the authors demonstrate that 26-alkylsteranes posited as sponge biomarkers can form during diagenesis of common algal sterols.

By subjecting chlorophyte lipid extracts to pyrolysis, the authors demonstrate that the lipid biomarkers 24-isopropylcholestane and 24-n-propylcholestane can be generated from algal C₂₉ sterol in experiments simulating diagenetic processes, thereby undermining their status as sponge biomarkers.

An analysis of the overlap between tropical forest restoration, human populations, development and national policies for community forest ownership shows that 294.5 million people live within forest restoration opportunity land in the Global South.

Comparing historical records with contemporary camera trap surveys, the authors report widespread declines in the occurrence of four large carnivore species from protected areas within the distributional range of the giant panda.

An assessment of the habitat of native vertebrate species burnt by the 2019–2020 Australian mega-fires shows that 70 taxa were severely affected.

The costs of echolocation during flight were thought to be negligible for bats, but here it is shown that this is true only below a certain intensity threshold. Above 130 dB, the costs of sound production become too expensive for small bats.

The German site of Schöningen preserves rare examples of Palaeolithic wooden artefacts. Here, a 300,000-year-old spruce wood implement is interpreted as a throwing stick on the basis of microscopic use-wear analysis.

Bird species with a higher propensity towards innovative behaviours are at a lower risk of global extinction and are more likely to have increasing or stable populations than less innovative birds

An analysis of 102 genomes shows remarkable levels of gene loss in ecdysozoans and deuterostomes and large genome novelties in deuterostomes and protostomes.

A framework is presented for achieving global no net loss of biodiversity that accounts for inequity among countries in both pressures and ability to act.