11 research outputs found
Human impact erodes chimpanzee behavioral diversity
Get PDFChimpanzees possess a large number of behavioral and cultural traits among nonhuman species. The “disturbance hypothesis” predicts that human impact depletes resources and disrupts social learning processes necessary for behavioral and cultural transmission. We used a dataset of 144 chimpanzee communities, with information on 31 behaviors, to show that chimpanzees inhabiting areas with high human impact have a mean probability of occurrence reduced by 88%, across all behaviors, compared to low-impact areas. This behavioral diversity loss was evident irrespective of the grouping or categorization of behaviors. Therefore, human impact may not only be associated with the loss of populations and genetic diversity, but also affects how animals behave. Our results support the view that “culturally significant units” should be integrated into wildlife conservation
Boots on the ground: the role of passive acoustic monitoring in evaluating anti-poaching patrols
No full textPassive acoustic monitoring is rapidly gaining recognition as a practical, affordable and robust tool for measuring gun hunting levels within protected areas, and consequently for its potential to evaluate anti-poaching patrols’ effectiveness based on outcome (i.e., change in hunting pressure) rather than effort (e.g., kilometres patrolled) or output (e.g., arrests). However, there has been no report to date of a protected area successfully using an acoustic grid to explore baseline levels of gun hunting activity, adapting its patrols in response to the evidence extracted from the acoustic data and then evaluating the effectiveness of the new patrol strategy. We report here such a case in Cameroon’s Korup National Park, where anti-poaching patrol effort was markedly increased in the 2015–2016 Christmas/New Year holiday season to curb the annual peak in gunshots recorded by a 12-sensor acoustic grid in the same period during the previous 2 years. Despite a three- to five-fold increase in patrol days, distance and area covered, the desired outcome – lower gun hunting activity – was not achieved under the new patrol scheme. The findings emphasize the need for adaptive wildlife law enforcement and how passive acoustic monitoring can help attain this goal, and they warn about the risks of using effort-based metrics of anti-poaching strategies as a surrogate for desired outcomes. We propose ways of increasing protected areas’ capacity to adopt acoustic grids as a law enforcement monitoring tool
Boots on the ground: the role of passive acoustic monitoring in evaluating anti-poaching patrols
No full textGovernance principles for the wildlife trade to reduce spillover and pandemic risk
No full textAbstract The COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath are the most significant socio-economic crises in modern history. The pandemic’s devastating impacts have prompted urgent policy and regulatory action to reduce the risks of future spillover events and pandemics. Stronger regulatory measures for the trade of wildlife are central to discussions of a policy response. A variety of measures, including broad bans on the trade and sale of wildlife to banning specific species for human consumption are among a suite of discussed options. However, the wildlife trade is diverse, complex, and important for the livelihoods of millions of people globally. We argue that reducing the risk of future pandemics stemming from the wildlife trade must follow established principles of governance which include being equitable, responsive, robust, and effective. We demonstrate how incorporating these principles will support the development of context-specific, culturally sensitive, and inclusive responses that recognize the on-the-ground complexity of disease emergence and the social-ecological systems in which the wildlife trade occurs
Proportion of protected areas with conservation activities between 1990 and 1999 across different African regions.
No full text<p>The number of protected areas with available information on presence and absence of any conservation activity (research, tourism and law enforcement guards) over the considered period were in total 105.</p
Influence of tourism activities and PA size on threat level in 83 PAs.
No full text<p>In bold are highlighted significant values (p <i><0.05</i>). See abbreviations in <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0114154#pone-0114154-t002" target="_blank">Tab 2</a>. AIC, Akaike's Information Criterion; AICw, Akaike Information Criterion weight; Rank, model rank from the smallest to the largest AIC value; k, number of variables including the intercept.</p><p>Influence of tourism activities and PA size on threat level in 83 PAs.</p
Influence of research activities and PA size on threat level in 92 PAs.
No full text<p>In bold are highlighted significant values (p <i><0.05</i>). See abbreviations in <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0114154#pone-0114154-t002" target="_blank">Tab 2</a>. AIC, Akaike's Information Criterion; AICw, Akaike Information Criterion weight; Rank, model rank from the smallest to the largest AIC value; k, number of variables including the intercept.</p><p>Influence of research activities and PA size on threat level in 92 PAs.</p
Symmetric matrix with Spearman's correlation between all threat impact levels recorded in 98 protected areas.
No full text<p>In bold are highlighted significant correlations (<i>p</i><0.0001) following post hoc test Bonferroni correction (<i>p</i> = 0.05/78). Abbreviations: coh, commercial hunting; suh, subsistence hunting; agr, agriculture; fuw, fuel wood; inf, infrastructure; has, human settlement around; his, human settlement inside; war, war; dis, disease; fir, fire; min, mining; log, logging.</p><p>Symmetric matrix with Spearman's correlation between all threat impact levels recorded in 98 protected areas.</p
Influence of law enforcement activities and PA size on threat levels in 90 PAs.
No full text<p>In bold are highlighted significant values (p <i><0.05</i>). See abbreviations in <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0114154#pone-0114154-t002" target="_blank">Tab 2</a>. AIC, Akaike's Information Criterion; AICw, Akaike Information Criterion weight; Rank, model rank from the smallest to the largest AIC value; k, number of variables including the intercept.</p><p>Influence of law enforcement activities and PA size on threat levels in 90 PAs.</p
Threats impact levels to 98 tropical African protected areas at a continental and regional scale.
No full text<p>Clockwise from top: Africa (a), Central Africa (b), East Africa (c) and West Africa (d).</p
