How are garbage dumps impacting vertebrate demography, heath, and conservation?

PLAZA, P.; LAMBERTUCCI SERGIO A

GLOBAL ECOLOGY AND CONSERVATION

ELSEVIER

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2017

2351-9894

Rubbish can be considered a food subsidy which represents a source of high energy value for different species thattake advantage of it. However, it could produce contrasting effects, both positive and negative. We reviewed whichspecies of terrestrial vertebrates (birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians) take advantage of dumps, and the effectsthat rubbish produces on them. We analysed 131 articles including 90 species that use dumps. Studies come from allover the world (including Antarctica), but mainly from Europe, North America and Africa. Effects reported on individualsand populations were manly considered positive but a quarter showed negative effects. Dumps are food resourcesthat may improve body condition, enhance reproductive performance and abundance, improve survival rate, altermovements, and they can be important for some endangered species. However, these places increase the risk ofpathogen infections and poisoning, can be responsible for the spread of alien species and favour conflicts betweenhumans and animals that use them. Moreover, species that take advantage of these sites can produce negativeimpacts on others that do not use them. The exponential increase in waste production at worldwide scale makes thispotential novel ecosystem important on shaping ecological communities. Therefore, the spatial and temporal effects ofdumps on wildlife should be studied more deeply at a community level and at a worldwide scale considering importantdifferences in waste production from developing to developed countries.