1. An increasing number of studies are examining the distribution and congruence of ecosystem services, often with the goal of identifying areas that will provide multiple ecosystem service ‘hotspots’. However, there is a paucity of data on most ecosystem services, so proxies (e.g. estimates of a service for a particular land cover type) are frequently used to map their distribution. To date, there has been little attempt to quantify the effects of using proxies on distribution maps of ecosystem services, despite the potentially large errors associated with such data sets. 2. Here, we provide the first study examining the effects of using proxies on ecosystem service maps and the degree of spatial congruence of these maps with primary data, using England as a case study. 3. We show that land cover based proxies provide a poor fit to primary data surfaces for biodiversity, recreation and carbon storage, and that correlations between ecosystem services change depending on whether primary or proxy data are used for the analyses. 4. The poor fit of proxies to primary data was also evident when we selected hotspots of single ecosystem services, and consistency between raw and modelled surfaces was extremely low when considering the locations that were coincident hotspots for multiple services. 5. Synthesis and applications. Proxies may be suitable for identifying broad-scale trends in ecosystem services, but even relatively good proxies are likely to be unsuitable for identifying hotspots or priority areas for multiple services.

Summary: Evidence‐based policy requires researchers to provide the answers to ecological questions that are of interest to policy makers. To find out what those questions are in the UK, representatives from 28 organizations involved in policy, together with scientists from 10 academic institutions, were asked to generate a list of questions from their organizations. During a 2‐day workshop the initial list of 1003 questions generated from consulting at least 654 policy makers and academics was used as a basis for generating a short list of 100 questions of significant policy relevance. Short‐listing was decided on the basis of the preferences of the representatives from the policy‐led organizations. The areas covered included most major issues of environmental concern in the UK, including agriculture, marine fisheries, climate change, ecosystem function and land management. The most striking outcome was the preference for general questions rather than narrow ones. The reason is that policy is driven by broad issues rather than specific ones. In contrast, scientists are frequently best equipped to answer specific questions. This means that it may be necessary to extract the underpinning specific question before researchers can proceed. Synthesis and applications. Greater communication between policy makers and scientists is required in order to ensure that applied ecologists are dealing with issues in a way that can feed into policy. It is particularly important that applied ecologists emphasize the generic value of their work wherever possible.

Summary: 1. Ecosystems support biodiversity and also provide goods and services that are beneficial to humans. The extent to which the locations that are most valuable for ecosystem services coincide with those that support the most biodiversity is of critical importance when designing conservation and land management strategies. There are, however, few studies on which to base any kind of conclusion about possible spatial patterns of association between ecosystem services and biodiversity. Moreover, little is known about the sensitivity of the conclusions to the quality of the data available, or to the choice and size of the region used for analysis. 2. Here, we first present national‐scale estimates of the spatial covariance in areas important for ecosystem services and biodiversity (richness of species of conservation concern), using Britain as a case study. We then explore how these associations are sensitive to the spatial resolution of the available data, the spatial extent of our study region and to regional variation across the study area. 3. Our analyses reveal a mixture of negative and positive associations. In particular, the regionalization analysis shows that one can arrive at diametrically opposing conclusions about relationships between ecosystem services and biodiversity by studying the same question within different areas, even within a moderately small island. 4. Synthesis and applications. In a policy context, the location‐specific nature of relationships between ecosystem services and biodiversity underscores the importance of multi‐scale environmental decision‐making, so as to reflect both local conditions and broader‐scale priorities. The results also suggest that efforts to establish general patterns of congruence in ecosystem services and biodiversity may offer a less constructive way forward than do more regional approaches.

Households across the developed world cumulatively spend many millions of dollars annually on feeding garden birds. While beneficial effects on avian assemblages are frequently claimed, the relationships between levels of garden bird feeding and local avian populations are unknown. Using data from a large UK city, we show that both avian species richness and abundance vary across different socioeconomic neighbourhood types. We examined whether patterns in bird feeding could explain this variation. The density of bird feeding stations across the urban environment was strongly positively related to avian abundance, after controlling for differences in habitat availability. This effect was almost exclusively driven by the abundance of those species known to utilize garden feeding stations frequently. In contrast, the density of feeding stations had no effect on avian species richness. We also examined variation in the proportion of households in different communities that provide food for birds, a factor that is not correlated with feeder density. The prevalence of bird feeding across different neighbourhoods declined as socioeconomic deprivation increased, and increased with avian species richness and abundance. Our results suggest that the provision of supplementary food for birds by multiple landowners across a city can impact the status of urban bird populations. The potential for harnessing these actions for conservation needs to be explored.