Read more
"Wildlife and the countryside are highly valued by people in the UK, and for good reason. Healthy habitats are invaluable assets and promote human well being. However, they are under increasing threat from, among other things, relentless urban expansion and intensive modern agriculture. These pressures largely stem from a major underlying cause - the high and growing population of humans living in the UK. This book provides an overview of wildlife in the UK and its recent status; factors contributing to wildlife declines, trends in human numbers, international deliberations about the impacts of human population growth, and the implications for the future of wildlife conservation in the UK. The evidence-based text includes comparisons of wildlife declines and their causes in other countries, providing a global perspective. This book is for ecologists, naturalists and conservation biologists studying and working in academia or in consultancies, as well as all those interested in wildlife conservation"--
List of contents
Preface; Acknowledgements; List of Abbreviations; 1. Population matters; 2. The state of British wildlife; 3. Human Activities directly killing wildlife; 4. Impacts of development on wildlife declines; 5. Impacts of farming and forestry on wildlife declines; 6. Climate change, disease and disturbance; 7. The human population and wildlife in Britain and western Europe; 8. Public perceptions of wildlife and population issues; 9. International aspects of population growth; 10. Conservation in a crowded country; References; Index.
About the author
Trevor J. C. Beebee is Emeritus Professor of evolution, behaviour and environment at the University of Sussex, UK, where he taught from 1976 to 2012. He has published over 200 papers, articles and books, including Climate Change and British Wildlife (Bloomsbury, 2018) which received the Marsh Award from the British Ecological Society for the most influential ecology book of 2019. He is also a trustee of Amphibian and Reptile Conservation, and a Fellow of the British Herpetological Society and the British Naturalists Association.
Summary
Written primarily for ecologists, naturalists and conservation biologists, this book identifies high human population as a root cause of species decline and environmental degradation across the UK. It discusses the implications for conservation and policies developed in response to wildlife and species decline.
