Projects

Contemporary ecological models of health prominently feature the natural environment as fundamental to the ecosystem services that support human life, health, and well-being. This survey of the literature aims to provide a more comprehensive picture—in the form of a primer—of the many simultaneously acting health co-benefits of green infrastructure.

Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) area managers and administrators have noted a lack of usable information about horse trails and horseback riders on MDC lands. Managers need to know what horseback riders want and what they would accept regarding trail development and maintenance, facility needs, and conflict management with other types of users. Managers also need more information on who the riders are, how often they recreate, and what they require for a quality recreational experience.

This study suggests that going for a walk in nature can have health promoting effects on stress-related brain regions, and consequently, it may act as a preventive measure against mental strain and potentially disease. Living in cities is associated with increased mental health risks. This study is causal in design and is an intervention study that investigates changes in the brain. This is the first study that we know to demonstrate the causal effects of acute exposure to natural vs. urban environment on stress-related brain regions, disentangling positive effects of nature from negative effects of city.

Biodiversity and biodiversity-based ecosystems services are intrinsically dependent on the climate. As biodiversity underlies all goods and services provided by ecosystems that are crucial for human survival and well-being, this paper synthesizes and discusses observed and anticipated impacts of climate change on biodiversity and biodiversity-based ecosystem service provision and livelihoods, and what strategies might be employed to decrease current and future risks on the well-being of human in Africa.

Background

This study aimed to explore whether walking in nature may be beneficial for individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD). Healthy adults demonstrate significant cognitive gains after nature walks, but it was unclear whether those same benefits would be achieved in a depressed sample as walking alone in nature might induce rumination, thereby worsening memory and mood.

Methods

Twenty individuals diagnosed with MDD participated in this study. At baseline, mood and short term memory span were assessed using the PANAS and the backwards digit span (BDS) task, respectively. Participants were then asked to think about an unresolved negative autobiographical event to prime rumination, prior to taking a 50 minute walk in either a natural or urban setting. After the walk, mood and short-term memory span were reassessed. The following week, participants returned to the lab and repeated the entire procedure, but walked in the location not visited in the first session (i.e., a counterbalanced within-subjects design).

Results

Participants exhibited significant increases in memory span after the nature walk relative to the urban walk, p < .001, ηp2= .53 (a large effect-size). Participants also showed increases in mood, but the mood effects did not correlate with the memory effects, suggesting separable mechanisms and replicating previous work.

Limitations

Sample size and participants’ motivation.

Conclusions

These findings extend earlier work demonstrating the cognitive and affective benefits of interacting with nature to individuals with MDD. Therefore, interacting with nature may be useful clinically as a supplement to existing treatments for MDD.

• Participants exhibited significant increases in memory span after the nature walk relative to the urban walk, p < .001, ηp 2= .53 (a large effect-size). Participants also showed increases in mood, but the mood effects did not correlate with the memory effects, suggesting separable mechanisms and replicating previous work.
• Effect sizes nearly 5 times in depressed (MDD) as large as the effect sizes observed in healthy.

Several secretive marsh bird (SMB) species are both migrants and breeders in Missouri. The degree to which individual birds stay to nest in Missouri versus continuing north to breed is unknown and has resulted in uncertainty regarding the role of Missouri’s wetlands for this group of birds. One key uncertainty identified by many Department wetland managers is whether their management actions are emulating wetland processes that enable SMBs to fulfill their life history requirements while in Missouri. For managers to ensure successful outcomes for individuals that use Missouri either as a stopover location or a nesting destination, they must know not only the key wetland conditions required by the birds but also the timing of when these resources are needed. Our objective was to determine the effects of hydrologic management and habitat characteristics on SMB nest site selection and daily nest survival at two spatial scales: the individual wetland and the nest point (area within 50 m of nest).

Several secretive marsh bird (SMB) species are listed as “Critically Imperiled” in Missouri; however, little information exists on SMB distribution and habitat use within the state. As a result, wetland managers are uncertain as to how much SMBs use Missouri wetlands and the wetland processes they need to emulate in order to provide habitat for this guild of species. For this Science Note, we focus on the migratory SMBs.

With nearly every survey Resource Science Division conducts, administration, budgeters, and staff ask “Wouldn’t online surveys save MDC money?” and we respond, “It depends!” Online surveys have become attractive as a presumably economical way to measure constituents’ preferences, opinions, and attitudes. However, issues such as non-response bias, sample validity, and sampling error due to internet access differences in the population can have effects on representativeness, reliability, and accuracy. We examined response rates, responses, demographics, and potential sources of bias in the 2016 post-season firearms deer and deer hunter opinion surveys using 1) a mail-back paper survey and 2) an online survey sent to a sample of those with an email address in the point-of-sale (POS) system.

This is the first annual report developed by MDC and submitted to the USFWS to meet the annual reporting requirements. The report describes MDC’s Bat HCP planning and implementation activities conducted during the initial reporting timeframe (February 23 – June 30, 2023), compliance and effectiveness monitoring activities, and the results of the compliance and effectiveness monitoring during the initial reporting timeframe. The goals of the annual report are to demonstrate to the USFWS and the citizens of Missouri that the MDC Bat HCP is being implemented properly, and to demonstrate the effectiveness of the conservation plan