Effectiveness of small road tunnels and fences in reducing amphibian roadkill and barrier effects; case studies of retrofitted roads in Sweden
- Published
- Accepted
- Subject Areas
- Biodiversity, Conservation Biology, Environmental Impacts
- Keywords
- Amphibians, Roadkill, Barrier effects, Road mitigation, Effectiveness, Sweden
- Copyright
- © 2019 Helldin et al.
- Licence
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
- Cite this article
- 2019. Effectiveness of small road tunnels and fences in reducing amphibian roadkill and barrier effects; case studies of retrofitted roads in Sweden. PeerJ Preprints 7:e27530v2 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.27530v2
Abstract
Schemes to reduce road impacts on amphibians have been implemented for decades in Europe, yet, several aspects on the effectiveness of such schemes remain poorly understood. Particularly in northern Europe, including Sweden, there is a lack of available information on road mitigation for amphibians, which is hampering implementation progress and cost-effectiveness analyses of mitigation options. Here we present data derived from systematic counts of amphibians during spring migration at three previous hot-spots for amphibian roadkill in Sweden, where amphibian tunnels with guiding fences have been installed. We used the data in combination with a risk model to estimate the number of roadkills and successful crossings before vs. after mitigation and mitigated vs. adjacent non-mitigated road sections. The estimated number of amphibians killed or at risk of being killed by car traffic decreased by 91–100% and the estimated number successfully crossing the road increased by 25–340% at mitigated road sections. Data however suggested fence-end effects that may moderate the reduction in roadkill. We discuss possible explanations for the observed differences between sites and construction types, and implications for amphibian conservation. We show how effectiveness estimates can be used for prioritizing amphibian passages along the existing road network. Finally, we emphasise the importance of careful monitoring of amphibian roadkill and successful crossings before and after amphibian passages are constructed.
Author Comment
Minor changes in the text have been made after suggestions from a reviewer.