Some of the main current threats to biodiversity are human-caused habitat loss and climate change. These can directly impact species that depend on specific habitats, like primary rainforest, and specific environmental conditions in those habitats (Coleman et al., 2019).
The helmeted hornbill is dependent on lowland primary rainforest across Southeast Asia, yet much of its habitat is changing due to deforestation and climate change (Ocampo-Peñuela et al., 2020; Vercoe et al., 2021).
One issue with protecting the helmeted hornbill from these risks is that we still don’t have accurate population estimates, or even locations of where the species lives. We also do not know how this species will respond to deforestation and climate change, and whether the species’ habitat is protected or not.
In our recent publication in Global Change and Ecology, we used species distribution modelling to:
- Estimate the location of current suitable habitat for helmeted hornbills across Borneo – to survey for better population estimates in the future.
- Project these predictions into the future – to estimate how climate change would affect the future species habitat.
- Assess the effectiveness of current Protected Areas and the ongoing Heart of Borneo Initiative plans at protecting the helmeted hornbill habitat.
This work is important for future population surveys, and for suggesting areas of protection and sustainable management for helmeted hornbills, as well as other important species across similar habitats.
References:
Coleman, J. L., Ascher, J. S., Bickford, D., Buchori, D., Cabanban, A., Chisholm, R. A., … & Carrasco, L. R. (2019). Top 100 research questions for biodiversity conservation in Southeast Asia. Biological Conservation, 234, 211-220. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2019.03.028.
Hatten, C. E. R., Hadiprakarsa, Y. Y., Lee, C. K. F., Jain, A., Kaur, R., Miller, A., … & Dingle, C. (2024). Predicting conservation priority areas in Borneo for the critically endangered helmeted hornbill (Rhinoplax vigil). Global Ecology and Conservation, e03206. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2024.e03206.
Ocampo-Peñuela, N., Garcia-Ulloa, J., Kornecki, I., Philipson, C. D., & Ghazoul, J. (2020). Impacts of Four Decades of Forest Loss on Vertebrate Functional Habitat on Borneo. Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, 3, 53. https://doi.org/10.3389/ffgc.2020.00053.
Vercoe, M., Barton, C., Kaur, R., Figueira, R., Macaulay, B., Boyd, M., & Ancrenaz, M. (2021). Artificial nest cavities can sustain populations of hornbills in the degraded forests of Kinabatangan, Borneo. Oryx, 55(3), 330-331. https://doi.org/10.1017/S003060532100020X.
Chloe Hatten 