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Research article2019Peer reviewedOpen access

Unravelling migration connectivity reveals unsustainable hunting of the declining ortolan bunting

Jiguet, Frederic; Robert, Alexandre; Lorrilliere, Romain; Hobson, Keith A.; Kardynal, Kevin J.; Arlettaz, Raphael; Bairlein, Franz; Belik, Viktor; Bernardy, Petra; Copete, Jose Luis; Czajkowski, Michel Alexandre; Dale, Svein; Dombrovski, Valery; Ducros, Delphine; Efrat, Ron; Elts, Jaanus; Ferrand, Yves; Marja, Riho; Minkevicius, Simonas; Olsson, Peter;
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Abstract

In France, illegal hunting of the endangered ortolan bunting Emberiza hortulana has been defended for the sake of tradition and gastronomy. Hunters argued that ortolan buntings trapped in southwest France originate from large and stable populations across the whole of Europe. Yet, the European Commission referred France to the Court of Justice of the European Union (EU) in December 2016 for infringements to legislation (IP/16/4213). To better assess the impact of hunting in France, we combined Pan-European data from archival light loggers, stable isotopes, and genetics to determine the migration strategy of the species across continents. Ortolan buntings migrating through France come from northern and western populations, which are small, fragmented and declining. Population viability modeling further revealed that harvesting in southwest France is far from sustainable and increases extinction risk. These results provide the sufficient scientific evidence for justifying the ban on ortolan harvesting in France.

Published in

Science Advances
2019, Volume: 5, number: 5, article number: eaau2642Publisher: AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE

      SLU Authors

    • Selstam, Gunnar

      • Department of Agricultural Research for Northern Sweden, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
      • Umeå University

    Sustainable Development Goals

    SDG15 Life on land

    UKÄ Subject classification

    Fish and Wildlife Management
    Ecology

    Publication identifier

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aau2642

    Permanent link to this page (URI)

    https://res.slu.se/id/publ/100680