[Tonya Lander:] Traditional conservation planning tends to be focused on...
designing corridors, such as hedgerows --
designed corridors between patches of native habitat
under the assumption that plants and insects will respond to habitat fragmentation
in the same way that those big charismatic species do.
The information that we have about the big charismatic species
is from radio tagging studies and quite fundamental research
that really seems to show that those things are important.
But actually there is very little evidence that plants or insects use those corridors.
[Tonya Lander:] At first we were really surprised by the idea that
the pollinators were moving long distances over pine plantation
and shorter distances over the native forest.
We thought, "does this mean we should clear-fell the native forest...
and plant pine plantations in order to facilitate pollen movement?"
Of course, that doesn't make any sense.
So then we developed these ideas about resource availability
and that actually -- as pollinators enter high resource areas --
they might not move very long distances because they've found what they're looking for.
It's part of what's called optimal foraging theory --
you spend as little energy as you need to
in order to collect as much resource as you can,
which makes perfect sense.
So, if you find the resources you're looking for,
you fill your little bee pockets or your little bee legs
and return the pollen and the nectar that you've found back to the nest.
Whereas, if they enter the pine plantations where there's vegetation cover,
but not necessarily the same perceived threat from predators,
then they travel through that space
but continue looking, continue traveling quite long distances,
because they haven't found the resources that they're looking for.
The Department of Forestry and Department of Environment are very keen
to find out practical suggestions in terms of management out there.
They're very keen to meet their obligations.
The Chileans know this is a really important area for biodiversity
and are keen to do good management,
as well as continuing to do the economic activity that's important to them.