Research Priorities from Animal Behaviour for Maximising Conservation Progress
Authors: Alison L. Greggor, Oded Berger-Tal, Daniel T. Blumstein, Lisa Angeloni, Carmen Bessa-Gomes, Bradley F. Blackwell, Colleen Cassady St Clair, Kevin Crooks, Shermin de Silva, Esteban Fernández-Juricic, Shifra Z. Goldenberg, Sarah L. Mesnick, Megan Owen, Catherine J. Price, David Saltz, Christopher J. Schell, Andrew V. Suarez, Ronald R. Swaisgood, Clark S. Winchell, William J. Sutherland
Journal: Trends in Ecology & Evolution (2016)

Conservation progress relies on communication between researchers and managers. Ethologists and wildlife managers determined 50 conservation research priorities. The list shows tremendous breadth and potential for conservation gain. We identify routes for developing efficient and cost-effective interventions. Poor communication between academic researchers and wildlife managers limits conservation progress and innovation. As a result, input from overlapping fields, such as animal behaviour, is underused in conservation management despite its demonstrated utility as a conservation tool and countless papers advocating its use. Communication and collaboration across these two disciplines are unlikely to improve without clearly identified management needs and demonstrable impacts of behavioural-based conservation management. To facilitate this process, a team of wildlife managers and animal behaviour researchers conducted a research prioritisation exercise, identifying 50 key questions that have great potential to resolve critical conservation and management problems. The resulting agenda highlights the diversity and extent of advances that both fields could achieve through collaboration. Poor communication between academic researchers and wildlife managers limits conservation progress and innovation. As a result, input from overlapping fields, such as animal behaviour, is underused in conservation management despite its demonstrated utility as a conservation tool and countless papers advocating its use. Communication and collaboration across these two disciplines are unlikely to improve without clearly identified management needs and demonstrable impacts of behavioural-based conservation management. To facilitate this process, a team of wildlife managers and animal behaviour researchers conducted a research prioritisation exercise, identifying 50 key questions that have great potential to resolve critical conservation and management problems. The resulting agenda highlights the diversity and extent of advances that both fields could achieve through collaboration. The successful conservation of biodiversity requires collective decision-making among multiple stakeholders with diverse viewpoints, including scientific researchers and applied wildlife managers. While the ultimate goals of academics and wildlife managers can be similar, the means by which they tackle conservation problems differ. Academics often focus on mechanisms or overarching principles, while pursuing questions that attract grants and publications. By contrast, managers require detailed and feasible solutions for handling specific situations and need evidence for the cost and effectiveness of their proposed projects, while competing for resources devoted to other species or habitats in need (Box 1). Such different approaches lead to conflicting research priorities. Conservation science and management crucially need both of these complementary perspectives, but collaboration between them is often weak [1Arlettaz R. et al.From publications to public actions: when conservation biologists bridge the gap between research and implementation.Bioscience. 2010; 60: 835-842Crossref Scopus (247) Google Scholar, 2Esler K.J. et al.How wide is the "knowing-doing" gap in invasion biology?.Biol. Invasions. 2010; 12: 4065-4075Crossref Scopus (82) Google Scholar, 3Knight A.T. et al.Knowing but not doing: selecting priority conservation areas and the research-implementation gap.Conserv. Biol. 2008; 22: 610-617Crossref PubMed Scopus (588) Google Scholar]. The following research agenda represents the outcome of a collaborative process between managers and researchers that developed priority areas for animal behaviour research with the aim of increasing its use in conservation biology. This process can be fine-tuned in the future as greater numbers of stakeholders engage in defining research priorities, and could become established as a way to stimulate conservation action more broadly in related fields. For such agendas to ultimately contribute to solving real-world problems, their subsequent research outputs must be made readily available to managers. Thus, research prioritisation exercises must go hand in hand with providing access to evidence about the effectiveness of new versus traditional techniques, similar to what has been championed in other conservation areas [4Sutherland W.J. et al.The need for evidence-based conservation.Trends Ecol. Evol. 2004; 19: 305-308Abstract Full Text Full Text PDF PubMed Scopus (1253) Google Scholar].Box 1Effective Conservation Behaviour: A Manager's Perspective.Effective conservation requires a clearly defined management problem. For instance, how can we reduce vehicular collisions for large carnivores as they move across the landscape? Following a clearly articulated problem, it is essential to identify key behaviours that are involved in the problem. For instance, age- or gender-specific movement patterns and habitat selection influence how predators interact with man-made infrastructure. Understanding these behaviours (both spatially and temporally) can allow engineers and managers to design structures to be properly placed to facilitate the movement of animals and minimise conflicts with humans. Additionally, identifying antipredator behaviours of prey can be essential to minimise predator–prey interactions concentrated by these structures. Understanding the mechanisms by which animals detect and respond to approaching vehicles is another part of the puzzle [67Lima S.L. et al.Animal reactions to oncoming vehicles – a conceptual review.Biol. Rev. Camb. Philos. Soc. 2015; 90: 60-76Crossref PubMed Scopus (76) Google Scholar]. Successfully transitioning from a potentially useful idea to deployment requires close collaboration between researchers and managers. Researchers should develop an understanding of the dynamic decision-making process of wildlife management if they wish their research to be widely applied. For example, any new initiative will compete with established research priorities for financial support and will require working through potential legal constraints at local, regional, or national levels.A few successful examples of behavioural research that have transitioned to successful management include (i) the construction of structures that facilitate crossing of roadways by a myriad of taxa, thus maintaining migration and gene flow [68Forman R.T. Safe Passages: Highways Wildlife, and Habitat Connectivity. Island Press, 2012Google Scholar]; (ii) the development of visual, acoustic, and olfactory deterrents used individually and in an integrated way to reduce the use of lethal control of animals exploiting human resources [69Blackwell B.F. Fernandez-Juricic E. Behavior and physiology in the development and application of visual deterrents at airports.in: DeVault T.L. Wildlife in Airport Environments: Preventing Animal–Aircraft Collisions through Science-Based Management. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013: 11-22Google Scholar]; (iii) the development of foraging deterrents that rely on a conditioned response to a repellent, and those based on post-ingestive malaise [70Baker S.E. et al.Non-lethal control of wildlife: using chemical repellents as feeding deterrents for the European Badger Meles meles.J. Appl. Ecol. 2005; 42: 921-931Crossref Scopus (36) Google Scholar, 71Kloppers E.L. et al.Predator-resembling aversive conditioning for managing habituated wildlife.Ecol. Soc. 2005; 10: 31Crossref Scopus (62) Google Scholar, 72Parsons M.H. Blumstein D.T. Familiarity breeds contempt: kangaroos persistently avoid areas with experimentally deployed dingo scents.PLoS ONE. 2010; 5: e10403Crossref PubMed Scopus (57) Google Scholar]; and (iv) the construction of road-embedded lighting to maintain a margin of safety for drivers without providing unnatural lighting cues for newly hatched sea turtles moving towards the surf line [73Bertolotti L. Salmon M. Do embedded roadway lights protect sea turtles?.Environ. Manage. 2005; 36: 702-710Crossref PubMed Scopus (32) Google Scholar]. In the absence of hypothesis-driven behavioural research tied to well-defined conservation problems, and without a willingness to move through the logistical hurdles facing the development of methods, conservation behaviour efforts could well fail. Ultimately, all management programmes should be evaluated using an evidence-based, adaptive management framework [74Nichols J.D. et al.Adaptive harvest management of North American waterfowl populations: a brief history and future prospects.J. Ornithol. 2007; 148: 343-349Crossref Scopus (183) Google Scholar, 75Williams B.K. Brown E.D. Adaptive Management: the US Department of the Interior Applications Guide. U.S. Department of the Interior, 2012Google Scholar], and their utility and cost-effectiveness must be compared with other options. Effective conservation requires a clearly defined management problem. For instance, how can we reduce vehicular collisions for large carnivores as they move across the landscape? Following a clearly articulated problem, it is essential to identify key behaviours that are involved in the problem. For instance, age- or gender-specific movement patterns and habitat selection influence how predators interact with man-made infrastructure. Understanding these behaviours (both spatially and temporally) can allow engineers and managers to design structures to be properly placed to facilitate the movement of animals and minimise conflicts with humans. Additionally, identifying antipredator behaviours of prey can be essential to minimise predator–prey interactions concentrated by these structures. Understanding the mechanisms by which animals detect and respond to approaching vehicles is another part of the puzzle [67Lima S.L. et al.Animal reactions to oncoming vehicles – a conceptual review.Biol. Rev. Camb. Philos. Soc. 2015; 90: 60-76Crossref PubMed Scopus (76) Google Scholar]. Successfully transitioning from a potentially useful idea to deployment requires close collaboration between researchers and managers. Researchers should develop an understanding of the dynamic decision-making process of wildlife management if they wish their research to be widely applied. For example, any new initiative will compete with established research priorities for financial support and will require working through potential legal constraints at local, regional, or national levels. A few successful examples of behavioural research that have transitioned to successful management include (i) the construction of structures that facilitate crossing of roadways by a myriad of taxa, thus maintaining migration and gene flow [68Forman R.T. Safe Passages: Highways Wildlife, and Habitat Connectivity. Island Press, 2012Google Scholar]; (ii) the development of visual, acoustic, and olfactory deterrents used individually and in an integrated way to reduce the use of lethal control of animals exploiting human resources [69Blackwell B.F. Fernandez-Juricic E. Behavior and physiology in the development and application of visual deterrents at airports.in: DeVault T.L. Wildlife in Airport Environments: Preventing Animal–Aircraft Collisions through Science-Based Management. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013: 11-22Google Scholar]; (iii) the development of foraging deterrents that rely on a conditioned response to a repellent, and those based on post-ingestive malaise [70Baker S.E. et al.Non-lethal control of wildlife: using chemical repellents as feeding deterrents for the European Badger Meles meles.J. Appl. Ecol. 2005; 42: 921-931Crossref Scopus (36) Google Scholar, 71Kloppers E.L. et al.Predator-resembling aversive conditioning for managing habituated wildlife.Ecol. Soc. 2005; 10: 31Crossref Scopus (62) Google Scholar, 72Parsons M.H. Blumstein D.T. Familiarity breeds contempt: kangaroos persistently avoid areas with experimentally deployed dingo scents.PLoS ONE. 2010; 5: e10403Crossref PubMed Scopus (57) Google Scholar]; and (iv) the construction of road-embedded lighting to maintain a margin of safety for drivers without providing unnatural lighting cues for newly hatched sea turtles moving towards the surf line [73Bertolotti L. Salmon M. Do embedded roadway lights protect sea turtles?.Environ. Manage. 2005; 36: 702-710Crossref PubMed Scopus (32) Google Scholar]. In the absence of hypothesis-driven behavioural research tied to well-defined conservation problems, and without a willingness to move through the logistical hurdles facing the development of methods, conservation behaviour efforts could well fail. Ultimately, all management programmes should be evaluated using an evidence-based, adaptive management framework [74Nichols J.D. et al.Adaptive harvest management of North American waterfowl populations: a brief history and future prospects.J. Ornithol. 2007; 148: 343-349Crossref Scopus (183) Google Scholar, 75Williams B.K. Brown E.D. Adaptive Management: the US Department of the Interior Applications Guide. U.S. Department of the Interior, 2012Google Scholar], and their utility and cost-effectiveness must be compared with other options. Animal behaviour research can influence conservation outcomes [5Candolin U. Wong B.B.M. Behavioural Responses to a Changing World; Mechanisms and Consequences. Oxford University Press, 2012Crossref Scopus (86) Google Scholar, 6Blumstein D.T. Fernández-Juricic E. A Primer on Conservation Behaviour. Sinauer, 2010Google Scholar] and serve as an indicator of anthropogenic impact [7Sih A. Understanding variation in behavioural responses to human-induced rapid environmental change: a conceptual overview.Anim. Behav. 2013; 85: 1077-1088Crossref Scopus (340) Google Scholar]. Perhaps more importantly, it can be used as a powerful management tool to modify the trajectory of crisis scenarios [8Berger-Tal O. et al.Integrating animal behavior and conservation biology: a conceptual framework.Behav. Ecol. 2011; 22: 236-239Crossref Scopus (176) Google Scholar], such as halting the spread of invasive species [9Tingley R. et al.Identifying optimal barriers to halt the invasion of cane toads Rhinella marina in arid Australia.J. Appl. Ecol. 2013; 50: 129-137Crossref Scopus (42) Google Scholar], or mitigating human–wildlife conflict [10Schakner Z.A. Blumstein D.T. Behavioral biology of marine mammal deterrents: a review and prospectus.Biol. Conserv. 2013; 167: 380-389Crossref Scopus (44) Google Scholar] (Box 2). Some applications of animal behaviour research have been recognised as having urgent conservation management functions, such as preventing the collapse of top predator populations [11Sutherland W.J. et al.One hundred questions of importance to the conservation of global biological diversity.Conserv. Biol. 2009; 23: 557-567Crossref PubMed Scopus (407) Google Scholar]. However, evidence for the effectiveness of animal behaviour as a conservation tool is not widely available, especially to managers. Therefore, it is important to determine not whether behaviour is valuable, but rather how behavioural research can be made more specifically relevant and available for conservation practitioners and wildlife managers to address current threats.Box 2The Links between Animal Behaviour and Conservation.There are three main ways in which behavioural research can be of use to conservation biologists and wildlife managers [8Berger-Tal O. et al.Integrating animal behavior and conservation biology: a conceptual framework.Behav. Ecol. 2011; 22: 236-239Crossref Scopus (176) Google Scholar, 76Berger-Tal O. Saltz D. Conservation Behavior, Applying Behavioral Ecology to Wildlife Conservation and Management. Cambridge University Press, 2016Crossref Google Scholar]:(i)The behaviour of animals is, in most cases, their first line of defence in the face of a changing environment, and the type and speed of the behavioural response will determine the impact of environmental change [77Charmantier A. et al.Adaptive phenotypic plasticity in response to climate change in a wild bird.Science. 2008; 320: 800-803Crossref PubMed Scopus (884) Google Scholar]. Understanding these behavioural responses could therefore allow us to recognise the mechanisms through which anthropogenic disturbances impact population dynamics and predict population trends (e.g., in creating ecological traps [78Robertson B.A. Hutto R.L. A framework for understanding ecological traps and an evaluation of existing evidence.Ecology. 2006; 87: 1075-1085Crossref PubMed Scopus (514) Google Scholar]).(ii)Knowledge of behavioural responses to natural and anthropogenic cues can allow us to design more effective mitigation strategies, and can play a crucial role in the successful implementation of conservation translocations, reserve and corridor design, invasive species control, and other conservation interventions (e.g., exploiting natural nonassociative learning processes to reduce impacts of alien predators [79Price C.J. Banks P.B. Exploiting olfactory learning in alien rats to protect birds' eggs.Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2012; 109: 19304-19309Crossref PubMed Scopus (33) Google Scholar]).(iii)Since behavioural responses to environmental changes will almost always precede demographic responses, behaviour can be used as a leading indicator for a variety of disturbances before demographic responses are evident [80Kotler B.P. Behavioral indicators and conservation: wielding "the biologist's tricorder.".Isr. J. Zool. 2007; 53: 237-244Google Scholar] and to monitor the effectiveness of management interventions (e.g., early indication of chemical pollution [36Hellou J. Behavioural ecotoxicology, an "early warning" signal to assess environmental quality.Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. Int. 2011; 18: 1-11Crossref PubMed Scopus (207) Google Scholar]).These three themes – understanding behavioural responses to anthropogenic disturbances, employing behavioural-based interventions, and identifying behavioural indicators – are complementary. Consequently, while most of the questions on our list are framed within one of these themes, they can be easily modified to fit the other two (Table I). Systematic reviews that tackle one of the questions on the list would do best to explore each of these themes in gathering evidence for the utility of a particular application of behaviour for conservationists.Table IModifying Questions under Different Conservation Behaviour ThemesThemeSample QuestionMeasuring behavioural responses to understand mechanisms of impactWhat demographically important behaviours are affected by harvest?Develop behavioural interventionsHow can knowledge of behaviour allow us to harvest populations in a more efficient and sustainable way?Use behaviour as conservation indicatorWhich behaviours alert us to the presence of poachers or overharvesting? Open table in a new tab There are three main ways in which behavioural research can be of use to conservation biologists and wildlife managers [8Berger-Tal O. et al.Integrating animal behavior and conservation biology: a conceptual framework.Behav. Ecol. 2011; 22: 236-239Crossref Scopus (176) Google Scholar, 76Berger-Tal O. Saltz D. Conservation Behavior, Applying Behavioral Ecology to Wildlife Conservation and Management. Cambridge University Press, 2016Crossref Google Scholar]:(i)The behaviour of animals is, in most cases, their first line of defence in the face of a changing environment, and the type and speed of the behavioural response will determine the impact of environmental change [77Charmantier A. et al.Adaptive phenotypic plasticity in response to climate change in a wild bird.Science. 2008; 320: 800-803Crossref PubMed Scopus (884) Google Scholar]. Understanding these behavioural responses could therefore allow us to recognise the mechanisms through which anthropogenic disturbances impact population dynamics and predict population trends (e.g., in creating ecological traps [78Robertson B.A. Hutto R.L. A framework for understanding ecological traps and an evaluation of existing evidence.Ecology. 2006; 87: 1075-1085Crossref PubMed Scopus (514) Google Scholar]).(ii)Knowledge of behavioural responses to natural and anthropogenic cues can allow us to design more effective mitigation strategies, and can play a crucial role in the successful implementation of conservation translocations, reserve and corridor design, invasive species control, and other conservation interventions (e.g., exploiting natural nonassociative learning processes to reduce impacts of alien predators [79Price C.J. Banks P.B. Exploiting olfactory learning in alien rats to protect birds' eggs.Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2012; 109: 19304-19309Crossref PubMed Scopus (33) Google Scholar]).(iii)Since behavioural responses to environmental changes will almost always precede demographic responses, behaviour can be used as a leading indicator for a variety of disturbances before demographic responses are evident [80Kotler B.P. Behavioral indicators and conservation: wielding "the biologist's tricorder.".Isr. J. Zool. 2007; 53: 237-244Google Scholar] and to monitor the effectiveness of management interventions (e.g., early indication of chemical pollution [36Hellou J. Behavioural ecotoxicology, an "early warning" signal to assess environmental quality.Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. Int. 2011; 18: 1-11Crossref PubMed Scopus (207) Google Scholar]). These three themes – understanding behavioural responses to anthropogenic disturbances, employing behavioural-based interventions, and identifying behavioural indicators – are complementary. Consequently, while most of the questions on our list are framed within one of these themes, they can be easily modified to fit the other two (Table I). Systematic reviews that tackle one of the questions on the list would do best to explore each of these themes in gathering evidence for the utility of a particular application of behaviour for conservationists.Table IModifying Questions under Different Conservation Behaviour ThemesThemeSample QuestionMeasuring behavioural responses to understand mechanisms of impactWhat demographically important behaviours are affected by harvest?Develop behavioural interventionsHow can knowledge of behaviour allow us to harvest populations in a more efficient and sustainable way?Use behaviour as conservation indicatorWhich behaviours alert us to the presence of poachers or overharvesting? Open table in a new tab Animal behaviour and conservation biology are vast disciplines, and a lack of communication between academics and applied practitioners has stalled their integration [12Caro T. Sherman P.W. Eighteen reasons animal behaviourists avoid involvement in conservation.Anim. Behav. 2013; 85: 305-312Crossref Scopus (36) Google Scholar, 13Fernández-Juricic E. Schulte B.A. Conservation behaviour: continued application, development and expansion.Anim. Behav. 2016; (Published online September 8, 2016)https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2016.07.022Crossref Scopus (4) Google Scholar]. The bulk of behavioural research can therefore seem irrelevant in conservation contexts [14Caro T. Human responses to changing environments: a comment on Wong and Candolin.Behav. Ecol. 2014; 26: 675-676Crossref Scopus (4) Google Scholar]. Accordingly, a clear link between research and management applications is often missing in academic discourse [13Fernández-Juricic E. Schulte B.A. Conservation behaviour: continued application, development and expansion.Anim. Behav. 2016; (Published online September 8, 2016)https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2016.07.022Crossref Scopus (4) Google Scholar, 15Game E.T. et al.Policy relevant conservation science.Conserv. Lett. 2015; 8: 309-311Crossref Scopus (28) Google Scholar]. Here, we begin the process of bridging this gap by prioritising behavioural questions that are most relevant to conservation actions, evaluating their efficacy, and stimulating future research [16Greggor A.L. et al.Translating cognitive insights into effective conservation programs: reply to Schakner et al.Trends Ecol. Evol. 2014; 29: 652-653Abstract Full Text Full Text PDF PubMed Scopus (3) Google Scholar, 17Blumstein D.T. Berger-Tal O. Understanding sensory mechanisms to develop effective conservation and management tools.Curr. Opin. Behav. Sci. 2015; 6: 13-18Crossref Scopus (35) Google Scholar] (Box 1). We conducted a research prioritisation exercise, employing a horizon scanning technique [18Sutherland W.J. Woodroof H.J. The need for environmental horizon scanning.Trends Ecol. Evol. 2009; 24: 523-527Abstract Full Text Full Text PDF PubMed Scopus (169) Google Scholar], to identify key questions in animal behaviour research that have the greatest potential to influence conservation outcomes. As a tool, such exercises are essential to translate research questions into policy and funding priorities [18Sutherland W.J. Woodroof H.J. The need for environmental horizon scanning.Trends Ecol. Evol. 2009; 24: 523-527Abstract Full Text Full Text PDF PubMed Scopus (169) Google Scholar]. Ideally, they encourage researchers to explore understudied topics and help policy makers and practitioners respond to key issues [19Sutherland W.J. et al.Enhancing the value of horizon scanning through collaborative review.Oryx. 2012; 46: 368-374Crossref Scopus (17) Google Scholar]. The process we followed, from the initial generation of questions to their final ranking, was an application of the Delphi technique [20Mukherjee N. et al.The Delphi technique in ecology and biological conservation: applications and guidelines.Methods Ecol. Evol. 2015; 6: 1097-1109Crossref Scopus (161) Google Scholar], using similar protocols to what has been advocated before [21Sutherland W.J. et al.Methods for collaboratively identifying research priorities and emerging issues in science and policy.Methods Ecol. Evol. 2011; 2: 238-247Crossref Scopus (247) Google Scholar]. This collective decision-making process downplays the input of any single individual's research bias, and has been applied in determining research priorities in other fields, for example, [22Kennicutt 2nd, M.C. et al.Polar research: six priorities for Antarctic science.Nature. 2014; 512: 23-25Crossref PubMed Scopus (150) Google Scholar]. We first recruited 85 experts in conservation biology or animal behaviour through an online survey that was distributed worldwide via email requests, personal networks, and Twitter sharing. Respondents were kept anonymous, but information was collected on their area of expertise, level of knowledge about animal behaviour, and their country of work and research. The survey asked people to identify the top areas of overlap between animal behaviour and conservation biology, and determine which research questions would have the greatest impact if they were to be answered. Respondents submitted 238 questions. The organisers removed redundancies and reformatted responses submitted as statements into 209 questions. Each of the 20 workshop participants (the authors) was then assigned a subset of the questions to further research with existing literature and define what concrete problems could be solved if they were to be answered. Participants came from a range of academic and applied conservation disciplines, representing research institutions or government agencies from Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas, and Australia. We gathered at the San Diego Zoo's Institute for Conservation Research to generate a priority list of 50 questions. The full question list was reduced to 50 through discussion, rewording, and voting (via a process similar to the question selection criteria set forth in [11Sutherland W.J. et al.One hundred questions of importance to the conservation of global biological diversity.Conserv. Biol. 2009; 23: 557-567Crossref PubMed Scopus (407) Google Scholar]). Each question had to be achievable in one or two research grants (2–3 years) when applied to a specific species or system, and to have clear conservation applications if answered. We reduced the original 209 questions to 50 in two steps. First, we grouped questions within eight topics of anthropogenic threat or conservation action and discussed them in four sessions of two parallel groups. After discussion, each group rated questions as 'gold' (top 40%), 'silver' (20%), or 'neither' (the rest). This step reduced the 209 original questions to 109 (listed in the Supplemental Information online). In a second step, the best silver questions were identified and then these and the gold questions were pruned by voting to a total of 55 gold and 25 silver questions. In a series of additional discussions and votes, the group eliminated the bottom gold questions and added the top silver ones to produce a final list of exactly 50 questions. The questions could be reworded for clarity at each stage. In the following sections, we present the final 50 questions, assigned to six categories of conservation topics. The questions are not ranked within or between sections; all should be viewed with equal potential to impact the field. Habitat loss is a primary threat to global biodiversity [23Schipper J. et al.The status of the world's land and marine mammals: diversity, threat, and knowledge.Science. 2008; 322: 225-230Crossref PubMed Scopus (1082) Google Scholar, 24Wilcove D.S. et al.Quantifying threats to imperiled species in the United States.Bioscience. 1998; 48: 607-615Crossref Scopus (2217) Google Scholar], and concurrent fragmentation severs landscape connectivity, a key consideration in reserve design and protected area management [25Crooks K.R. Sanjayan M.A. Connectivity Conservation. Cambridge University Press, 2006Crossref Google Scholar]. Knowledge of animal behaviour is fundamental in understanding and mit