Harmonizing Biodiversity Conservation with Agricultural Production Across Working Landscapes
Balancing food production with conservation of biodiversity is one of the most challenging topics in ecology and environmental science, broadly. Using an innovative combination of field and data science methods, Professor Karp’s research program yields invaluable insights into how biodiversity affects and is affected by agriculture both in the tropics and in the US.
—Ashley Larsen, Associate Professor, Bren School
Email events@bren.ucsb.edu to request access to a recording of this talk
ABSTRACT
A critical challenge for this century is transitioning towards sustainable farming systems that simultaneously produce food and conserve wildlife. Yet conservation scientists and practitioners have traditionally fixated on protected areas and overlooked opportunities for conserving wildlife alongside us in working landscapes. The Karp Lab at UC Davis uses ecological research to develop strategies for co-managing agriculture for conservation, crop production, and food-safety outcomes, both in the tropics and here in California. For this talk, Daniel will first explore how habitat conversion is affecting bird communities in Costa Rica, discussing which species are likely to persist in farming landscapes and which are not. He will then consider how climate change may affect species’ abilities to thrive in agriculture looking forward. Finally, Daniel will shift his focus to California agricultural systems, where recent foodborne disease outbreaks have created strong pressure on produce farmers to reduce wildlife intrusion into crop fields by removing non-crop habitat. Specifically, he will evaluate not only how habitat removal affects potential food-safety risks from wildlife but also consider potential tradeoffs for conserving biodiversity, controlling pests, and maintaining high crop yields.
BIO
Daniel Karp is an associate professor in the Department of Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology at the University of California, Davis. Daniel completed his Ph.D. in 2013 and undergraduate studies in 2009 at Stanford University’s Department of Biology. Following his graduate studies, Daniel became an inaugural NatureNet postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley and the Nature Conservancy. He then received a Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship to conduct research at The University of British Colombia, before joining the faculty at UC Davis in 2016. Daniel’s interests center on developing innovative methods for harmonizing food production with the conservation of ecosystem services and biodiversity. His lab thus broadly focuses on developing innovative solutions for reconciling conservation activities with food production practices.