Diversity and difference in the everyday lives of Ugandan street children: The significance of age and gender for understanding the use of space

Childhood is characterised by diversity and difference across and within societies. Street children have a unique relationship to the urban environment evident through their use of the city. The everyday geographies that street children produce are diversified through the spaces they frequent and the activities they engage in. Drawing on a range of children-centred qualitative methods, this article focuses on street children's use of urban space in Kampala, Uganda. The article demonstrates the importance of considering variables such as gender and age in the analysis of street children's socio-spatial experiences, which, to date, have rarely been considered in other accounts of street children's lives. In addition the article highlights the need for also including street children's individuality and agency into understanding their use of space. The article concludes by arguing for policies to be sensitive to the diversity that characterises street children's lives and calls for a more nuanced approach where policies are designed to accommodate street children's age and gender differences, and their individual needs, interests and abilities.

Diversity and difference in the everyday lives of Ugandan street children: The significance of age and gender for understanding the use of space

Childhood is characterised by diversity and difference across and within societies. Street children have a unique relationship to the urban environment evident through their use of the city. The everyday geographies that street children produce are diversified through the spaces they frequent and the activities they engage in. Drawing on a range of children-centred qualitative methods, this article focuses on street children's use of urban space in Kampala, Uganda. The article demonstrates the importance of considering variables such as gender and age in the analysis of street children's socio-spatial experiences, which, to date, have rarely been considered in other accounts of street children's lives. In addition the article highlights the need for also including street children's individuality and agency into understanding their use of space. The article concludes by arguing for policies to be sensitive to the diversity that characterises street children's lives and calls for a more nuanced approach where policies are designed to accommodate street children's age and gender differences, and their individual needs, interests and abilities.

Response of plant-pollinator communities to fire: changes in diversity, abundance and floral reward structure

Globally, plant-pollinator communities are subject to a diverse array of perturbations and in many temperate and semi-arid systems fire is a dominant structuring force. We present a novel and highly integrated approach, which quantifies, in parallel, the response to fire of pollinator communities, floral communities and floral reward structure. Mt Carmel, Israel is a recognised bee-flower biodiversity hotspot, and using a chronosequence of habitats with differing post-fire ages, we follow the changes in plant-pollinator community organisation from immediately following a burn until full regeneration of vegetation. Initially, fire has a catastrophic effect on these communities, however, recovery is rapid with a peak in diversity of both flowers and bees in the first 2 years post-fire, followed by a steady decline over the next 50 years. The regeneration of floral communities is closely matched by that of their principal pollinators. At the community level we quantify, per unit area of habitat, key parameters of nectar and pollen forage known to be of importance in structuring pollinator communities. Nectar Volume, nectar water content, nectar concentration and the diversity of nectar foraging niches are all greatest immediately following fire with a steady decrease as regeneration proceeds. Temporal changes in energy availability for nectar, pollen, total energy (nectar + pollen) and relative importance of pollen to nectar energy show a similar general decline with site age, however, the pattern is less clear owing to the highly patchy distribution of floral resources. Changes in floral reward structure reflect the general shift from annuals (generally low-reward open access flowers) to perennials (mostly high-reward and restricted access flowers) as post-fire regeneration ensues. The impact of fire on floral communities and their associated rewards have clear implications for pollinator community structure and we discuss this and the role of other disturbance factors on these systems.

The distribution of species diversity across a flora's component lineages: dating the Cape's 'relicts'

The Cape Floristic Region is exceptionally species-rich both for its area and latitude, and this diversity is highly unevenly distributed among genera. The modern flora is hypothesized to result largely from recent (post-Oligocene) speciation, and it has long been speculated that particular species-poor lineages pre-date this burst of speciation. Here, we employ molecular phylogenetic data in combination with fossil calibrations to estimate the minimum duration of Cape occupation by 14 unrelated putative relicts. Estimates vary widely between lineages (7-101 Myr ago), and when compared with the estimated timing of onset of the modern flora's radiation, it is clear that many, but possibly not all, of these lineages pre-date its establishment. Statistical comparisons of diversities with lineage age show that low species diversity of many of the putative relicts results from a lower rate of diversification than in dated Cape radiations. In other putative relicts, however, we cannot reject the possibility that they diversify at the same underlying rate as the radiations, but have been present in the Cape for insufficient time to accumulate higher diversity. Although the extremes in diversity of currently dated Cape lineages fall outside expectations under a underlying diversification rate, sampling of all Cape lineages would be required to reject this null hypothesis.

Bryophyte diversity and community structure on thatched roofs of the Holnicote Estate, Somerset, U.K.

We investigated patterns of bryophyte species richness and community structure, and their relation to roof variables, on thatched roofs of the Holnicote Estate, South Somerset. Thirty-two bryophyte species were recorded from 28 sampled roofs, including the globally rare and endangered thatch moss, Leptodontium gemmascens. Multiple regression analyses revealed that thatch age has a highly significant positive effect on the number of species present, accounting for nearly half the observed variation in species richness after removal of outliers. Aspect has a slight and marginally significant effect on species diversity (accounting for an additional 6% of variation), with north-facing samples having slightly more species. Age also has a significant impact on total bryophyte cover after removal of outlying observations. TWINSPAN analysis of bryophyte cover data suggests the existence of at least five discrete communities. Simple Discriminant Analyses indicate that these communities occupy different ecological subspaces as defined by the measured roof variables, with pitch, aspect and thatch age emerging as especially significant attributes. Contingency Analysis indicates that some communities are disfavoured by water reed as compared to wheat straw. The findings are significant for understanding the structure of bryophyte communities, for evaluating the effect of bryophyte cover on thatch performance, and for conservation of thatch communities, especially those harbouring rare species.

Palaeovegetation (Communications arising): diversity of temperate plants in east Asia

The exceptionally broad species diversity of vascular plant genera in east Asian temperate forests, compared with their sister taxa in North America, has been attributed to the greater climatic diversity of east Asia, combined with opportunities for allopatric speciation afforded by repeated fragmentation and coalescence of populations through Late Cenozoic ice-age cycles1. According to Qian and Ricklefs1, these opportunities occurred in east Asia because temperate forests extended across the continental shelf to link populations in China, Korea and Japan during glacial periods, whereas higher sea levels during interglacial periods isolated these regions and warmer temperatures restricted temperate taxa to disjunct refuges. However, palaeovegetation data from east Asia2, 3, 4, 5, 6 show that temperate forests were considerably less extensive than today during the Last Glacial Maximum, calling into question the coalescence of tree populations required by the hypothesis of Qian and Ricklefs1.

Patterns of hominin occupation and cultural diversity across the Gebel Akhdar of Northern Libya over the last ~200 kyr

Excavations at Haua Fteah cave in Cyrenaica, Libya, have revealed a cultural sequence that may span the last glacial–interglacial-glacial cycle. The TRANS-NAP project has been re-excavating Haua Fteah and conducting geoarchaeological survey of an ecologically diverse landscape that includes the fertile Gebel Akhdar and littoral, pre-desert, and desert biomes. A major aim of this project is to characterize cultural and environmental changes across the region and correlate the surface archaeology with that from Haua Fteah. To date, 181 sites have been recorded, ranging from the Middle Stone Age (MSA) to Late Stone Age (LSA). Their geographic distribution suggests temporal variation in patterns of hominin habitat preference, with significantly more LSA than MSA sites at higher elevations. The surface archaeology also points to substantial spatiotemporal technological variation within the MSA. These patterns may be explained by both paleoenvironmental change and paleodemographic shifts in the region, resulting in a variety of hominin adaptive responses.