Invasive mammal eradication on islands results in substantial conservation gains.

More than US$21 billion is spent annually on biodiversity conservation. Despite their importance for preventing or slowing extinctions and preserving biodiversity, conservation interventions are rarely assessed systematically for their global impact. Islands house a disproportionately higher amount of biodiversity compared with mainlands, much of which is highly threatened with extinction.

Rat eradication and the resistance and resilience of passerine bird assemblages in the Falkland Islands.

Norway rats (Rattus norvegicus) were introduced to the Falkland Islands and are detrimental to native passerines. Rat eradication programmes are being used to help protect the avifauna. This study assesses the effectiveness of eradication programmes while using this conservation practice as a natural experiment to explore the ecological resistance, resilience and homeostasis of bird communities.

Post-fledging dispersal of king penguins (Aptenodytes patagonicus) from two breeding sites in the South Atlantic.

Most studies concerning the foraging ecology of marine vertebrates are limited to breeding adults, although other life history stages might comprise half the total population. For penguins, little is known about juvenile dispersal, a period when individuals may be susceptible to increased mortality given their naïve foraging behaviour. Therefore, we used satellite telemetry to study king penguin fledglings (n = 18) from two sites in the Southwest Atlantic in December 2007.