Nagpur: A new scientific monograph titled ‘Spatial dynamics and ecology of large ungulate populations in tropical forests of India’ by Centre for Wildlife Studies (CWS) scientists and collaborators has delivered better results to save ungulates.
The publication is based on fieldwork and analyses conducted on population ecology of five species of threatened ungulates — gaur, sambar, chital, muntjac, and wild pig in the Nagarahole-Bandipur protected landscape. The study has been published by Springer Nature.
The study involved the conduct of line-transect surveys on foot, designed and implemented advanced distance sampling methods. The data generated was analyzed using spatially explicit hierarchical distance sampling models, one of the first studies in the world employing these advanced methods.
The study rigorously estimated population densities of these five ungulates at both local and landscape scales, and explored causal factors underlying the variations in their densities in terms of different ecological and management factors.
The results showed that population densities of focal species locally varied between 0.2 and 5.1 / sq km for gaur, 0.5 and 8.1 sq km for sambar, 0.9 and 39.8 sq km for chital, 0.1 and 0.7 sq km for muntjac and, 0.1 and 1.1 sq km for wild pig, in response to varying environmental factors.
The analytic methodology of Bayesian Hierarchical modelling used by the authors, generated more rigorous and nuanced results useful for conservation, without involving any additional investment of resources compared to the standard line transect sampling.
One of the scientists, Samba Kumar said, “Our results have both scientific and management implications. These are the first population ecology data and results gathered at such fine-grained scales on these vulnerable species which are under threat across their range in Asia. The study also highlights the importance of strict anti-hunting measures and regulation of human impacts on habitats, which are far more important to recover these species than many of the expensive commonly employed habitat management practices. Our study also provides a scientifically robust decision-making framework to prioritize management actions to accomplish conservation goals.”
Noted wildlife zoologist K Ullas Karanth says, “The approaches we developed and the results we generated have wide application for surveying large ungulate populations all over the world. In view of the fact that almost all the putative line-transect surveys now being conducted across Asia, including those in India, lack rigour and generate unreliable results, there is ample scope for adopting our methods in the future. Because tropical forest ungulates are under serious threat, I hope such adoption will be prioritized by the government.”
James Nichols from University of Florida said, “With a few notable exceptions, our knowledge of the population ecology of large, mobile animals is very limited, primarily because of the difficulty of studying such animals at relevant spatial scales. The study reported in this book is exceptional in being well-planned, well-executed via an enormous, supervised field effort, and well-analyzed using state-of-the-art data-analytic approaches. As a result, the study provides strong inferences about the spatial ecology and conservation of the focal ungulates and provides a model for the large-scale study of mobile animal populations.”
The scientific monograph is authored by N Samba Kumar, K Ullas Karanth, CWS, Bengaluru, James D Nichols, USA, Srinivas Vaidyanathan, Foundation for Ecological Research, Advocacy & Learning, Pondicherry, Beth Gardner, University of Washington, and Jagdish Krishnaswamy, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment.