University of São Paulo “Luiz de Queiroz” College of Agriculture Center of Nuclear Energy in Agriculture Combining species distribution modelling and environmental perceptions to support sustainable strategies for Amazon-nut (Bertholletia excelsa Bonpl.) planting and conservation Daiana Carolina Monteiro Tourne Thesis presented to obtain the degree of Doctor in Science. Area: Applied Ecology Piracicaba 2018 Daiana Carolina Monteiro Tourne Forest engineer Combining species distribution modelling and environmental perceptions to support sustainable strategies for Amazon-nut (Bertholletia excelsa Bonpl.) planting and conservation versão revisada de acordo com a resolução CoPGr 6018 de 2011 Advisor: Profa. Dra. MARIA VICTORIA RAMOS BALLESTER Thesis presented to obtain the degree of Doctor in Science. Area: Applied Ecology Piracicaba 2018 2 Dados Internacionais de Catalogação na Publicação DIVISÃO DE BIBLIOTECA – DIBD/ESALQ/USP Tourne, Daiana Carolina Monteiro Combining species distribution modelling and environmental perceptions to support sustainable strategies for Amazon-nut (Bertholletia excelsa Bonpl.) planting and conservation / Daiana Carolina Monteiro Tourne. -- versão revisada de acordo com a resolução CoPGr 6018 de 2011. - - Piracicaba, 2018. 102p. Tese (Doutorado) - - USP / Escola Superior de Agricultura “Luiz de Queiroz”/ Centro de Energia Nuclear na Agricultura. 1. Modelagem de habitat 2. Percepção ambiental 3. Espécie ameaçada 4. Conservação. 5. Amazônia I. Título 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thanks my advisor Dr. Maria Victoria Ramos Ballester for her supporting and encouraging me to develop this research. I also thank my supervisor in the internship abroad, Dr. Patrick M. A. James for has sharing his knowledge and opportunity of work together. I am grateful to orientation committee’s members for their comments and suggestions for this research. Specially, I thank Dr. Lucieta G. Martorano who helped me in both chapters of this Thesis and she has been giving me great scientific advices in the last 10 years. I also greatly appreciate the researchers who shared databases of Amazon-nut occurrence and who participated of experts’painel in 2016. Specially, Dr. Evert Thomas, Dr. Marcelino Guedes, Dr. Katia Emidio, Dr. Lucia Wadt, Dr. Ana Euler and Dr. Water Sousa for considerable efforts to discuss methodological aspects and results found in this research. I am sure without this interdisciplinary group, it will be impossible have a research with quality. I express my gratitude the traditional communities, the public managers and local technicians who participated of environmental perception activities. They certainly left me to know more about the current situation of the Amazon-nut. I hope I have demostrated their point of view in this work. I must give thanks to all collaborators of this project, specially Dr. Juliana Vicentine and Dr. Simone Sartorio for their valued advices about social and biophysical data analyses. Thanks Joice Fernandes, Rodrigo Figueiredo, Juliana and Jorge Santos for their fieldwork support. You were fantastic! I equally tkanks Prof. Acacio Melo (IFPA Castanhal), Auricelia Gonçalvez (Flona Nativa), Jorge Araujo (Floagri) and Richelly Costa (FUNAI) for help me in the field activities and encoraging people to participate of this research. I thank my collegues and friends from Environmental analysis and geoprocessing laboratory (Brazil) and Landscape ecology, forest disturbance, population genetics, ecosystem modelling laboratory (Canada) who helped me to solve many operational problems, shared several moments of learning and fun. I also thanks all my Piracicabanos and Paraense’s friends for all their support. I sincerely thank my husband Thomas Tourne for his love, patience and support. I also thanks all my family, specially my relatives and my sister for their endless love and continuously give me their support in my dedicions. I love you! I also thank my painting teacher Joji Kussonoki for all advices and tecniques shared. I would like to thanks the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES) for financial support, as well as, to Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) in the Brazil (2015/04749-1) and in the Canada (2016/16718-6). These financial supports were essential to work out in the field expeditions in the Amazon, to poster presentation in international conference and internship abroad. Lastly, I thanks to University of Sao Paulo and Interunit in Applied Ecology postgraduate program for believe in the social and enviromental importance of this study. 4 “When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world”. (John Muir) © Watercolor painting by Daiana Tourne, 2018. 5 SUMMARY ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................................................... 7 1. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................. 9 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................................................. 12 2. MODELLING HABITAT SUITABILITY OF AMAZON-NUT (BERTHOLLETIA EXCELSA) IN PANAMAZONIA: TESTING DIFFERENT STRATEGIES TO OPTIMIZE MODEL FIT ...................... 19 ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................................................................... 19 2.1 INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................................ 20 2.2 MATERIAL AND METHODS ........................................................................................................................... 23 2.2.1 Occurrence data .................................................................................................................................. 23 2.2.2 Environmental data ............................................................................................................................. 23 2.2.3 Removing bias ..................................................................................................................................... 25 2.2.4 Predictor selection .............................................................................................................................. 26 2.2.5 Setting and fitting models .................................................................................................................... 28 2.2.6 Model performance ............................................................................................................................. 29 2.3 RESULTS ...................................................................................................................................................... 31 2.3.1 Candidate predictor variables ............................................................................................................ 31 2.3.2 Habitat suitability model ..................................................................................................................... 33 2.4 DISCUSSION ................................................................................................................................................. 38 2.4.1 Amazon-nut habitat suitability ............................................................................................................ 38 2.4.2 Methodological aspects ....................................................................................................................... 42 2.5 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................................................... 44 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................................................. 45 3. LOCAL COMMUNITIES, PUBLIC MANAGERS AND RESEARCHERS ENGAGED TO DISCUSS OBSTACLES TO PLANTING AND CONSERVATION OF THE BERTHOLLETIA EXCELSA IN THE AMAZON ............................................................................................................................................................. 55 ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................................................................... 55 3.1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................ 56 3.2 MATERIAL AND METHODS ........................................................................................................................... 58 3.2.1 Study area and participants ................................................................................................................ 58 3.2.2 Municipality’s background ................................................................................................................. 59 3.2.3 Recruitment of the participants ........................................................................................................... 61 3.2.4 Ethical approval and consent .............................................................................................................. 62 3.2.5 Data collection ...................................................................................................................................