João Pedro Leite Faria

I began my research career studying Mediterranean farmland birds MSc’s Thesis, where I researched Habitat fragmentation and Nest Predation in Farmland areas, focusing on their implications on steppe-bird species of conservation concern. I shifted my focus slightly for a while, to try to understand the environmental and landscape variables influencing wild rabbit distribution in the Azores archipelago. However, I continued invested on Farmland bird ecology, having completed a PhD that assessed how climate and land-use change affect this highly sensitive group. Since then, I have worked across several applied conservation subjects, including risk assessment for exotic bird species in arid regions and supporting the development of the EU Birds Directive reporting process by compiling and validating bird data for several species from the Azores.

My current scientific interests sit at the interface of global change ecology, monitoring of population dynamics, and evidence-based conservation, with a particular focus on translating ecological data into management and policy-relevant outcomes. Specifically, I am currently engaged in the monitoring and conservation of hunted species, combining field-based surveys and hunting data with robust modelling techniques to inform sustainable management and long-term conservation planning.