Landscape ecology and conservation: moving from description to application

Abstract

The focus of conservation biology has been predominantly the study of single species, and conservation management and legislation has been directed mostly at the species level. Increasingly, however, there has been a recognition that ecosystems and landscapes need to be considered, since they form the physical and biotic context within which species exist. Increased emphasis on the landscape scale suggests that the emerging discipline of landscape ecology might have much to offer conservation biology. Landscape ecology is still a young science with no well-defined theoretical framework and little rigorous quantitative methodology. It aims to study patterns, processes and changes at the scale of hectares to square kilometers. Its focus on the pattern and dynamics of ecosystems or patches within a landscape offers much which is of relevance to conservation biology. Topics such as disturbance, patch dynamics, metapopulation dynamics, landscape flows, connectivity and fragmentation all have relevance to the conservation of biodiversity in natural, altered and rapidly changing systems. The papers in this issue provide a cross section of Australian research into landscape ecology which is of relevance to conservation biology. Methodological, theoretical and practical aspects are covered. I suggest that effective conservation of biodiversity will be achieved only if the landscape context is taken into account.