#Habitat research methods give a new peek at tiger lifefrom a tiger's point of view yesterday's thoughtful conservation plans might be today's reason to branch out.
An international team of researchers has found a useful way to better understand the tiger's take on policy.
Now research on tiger habitat in Nepal published this week's Ecosphere journal of the Ecological Society of America again shows that conservation demands not only good policy but monitoring even years down the road.
and requires innovative methods Liu said Now we're learning that Nepal's outstanding efforts to protect tigers are supported best with close monitoring
Carter has spent years studying endangered tigers in Chitwan National park in Nepal's Himalayan lowlands. The park established in 1973 to protect both the tigers
and the area's biodiversity was not without cost to the people who live around the area.
In Ecosphere Carter reports a unique approach to monitoring the condition of the tiger's habitat by combining satellite images
and camera trap data on where the tigers were hanging out. Tigers like grasslands which support high prey numbers
and likely give tigers cover to hunt their prey. Because tigers require large areas they prefer their cover not be broken too up.
Turns out that growing human populations around Nepal are growing and with that increasing unauthorized human use of local natural resources is reducing the quality of tiger habitat inside Chitwan National park. The tigers are finding friendly neighborhoods outside the park--which is important input both for the buffer's policies
and the park's policies. Many animals have their ranges extending outside of protected areas Carter said.
They don't know and they don't care where the border signs are. So areas outside protected areas are important as well.
and grasslands it allowed Carter to see where tigers were hanging out and insight into why.
It turns out that over a 20-year span Chitwan National park still is a desirable place for tigers.
But it is the buffer's tiger habitat that has improved gradually while the park's habitat has degraded gradually.
Positive results first with a cat allergy therapy and now with house dust mite and grass allergy treatments suggest that this approach may be used for many common allergies.
For example fragmentation reduces the availability of interior forest habitat that is preferred by many bird species. There are also a number of large predators such as big cats like the tiger
#Crop-raiding elephants flee tiger growlswild Asian elephants slink quietly away at the sound of a growling tiger
but trumpet and growl before retreating from leopard growls researchers at the University of California Davis have found.
We noticed that the elephants were scared more of tigers than of leopards said Vivek Thuppil who carried out the work with Richard Coss professor of psychology at UC Davis as part of his Ph d. in animal behavior.
The researchers set up equipment to play back leopard or tiger growls triggered when the elephants crossed infrared beams across paths leading to crop fields
and captured the events on video. Leopards aren't known to prey on elephants but tigers will sometimes attack a young elephant that becomes separated from the herd.
Although their initial reactions were very different the elephants ultimately retreated from growls of both cats.
The elephants might be confused by the leopard growl Thuppil said. A real leopard would most likely retreat from a group of elephants.
Still there's probably no benefit to the elephants in risking an encounter with a leopard
even if it is known not a predator. You don't want to mess with something with claws and teeth Thuppil said.
They're acting in a very intelligent way Coss said. Wild elephant populations are stable
or even increasing in forest areas Thuppil said. While the forest itself is protected human settlement increasingly has moved into the buffer areas surrounding the forest
They give feeling of pungency in the mouth the feel of a cat's tongue licking your hand.
#Protect corridors to save tigers, leopardsresearch by Clemson University conservation geneticists makes the case that landscape-level tiger
and leopard conservation that includes protecting the corridors the big cats use for travel between habitat patches is the most effective conservation strategy for their long-term survival.
Sandeep Sharma and Trishna Dutta with colleagues from the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute reveal their findings in articles in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B:
Their articles say that forest corridors play an essential role in maintaining the flow of genes between tiger
and leopard populations in central India and are paramount for sustaining the genetic variation required for their long-term persistence.
In the first ever gene-flow analysis of these big cats Sharma and Dutta analyzed the genes of the estimated 273 tigers
and 217 leopards living in four distinct populations in the 17375-mile Satpura-Maikal region of central India then used computer modeling to compare contemporary and historical gene flow among the region's tiger
and leopard populations. The genetic data showed that the region's tiger population divided rapidly twice in history:
First into two clusters about 700 years ago when great swathes of central India's forestland were cleared for agricultural use during the early Mughal era;
then into four clusters around 200 years ago when The british Empire cut vast tracts of timber to build railroads and ships.
This period also corresponded with a huge increase in tiger hunting. Today these big cats live at high densities in the four protected areas.
Some of the areas are connected by relatively contiguous corridors of forest while others are connected by sparse and fragmented corridors.
while the flow of genes between the four tiger and leopard populations has decreased over time clusters linked by contiguous forest corridors have maintained a high rate of gene flow.
Reserves that have lost connectivity between them have seen the greatest decline in gene flow The research suggests that given the fact of limited financial and human capital the big cats would be served better by extending conservation efforts beyond source habitats to a larger landscape scale.
The viability of the forest corridors connecting tiger habitats has a direct affect on a tigers'chance of finding an unrelated mate
and on the ability of tiger populations to maintain genetic diversity Dutta said. As we know genetic diversity allows species to survive disease
Currently central India's tiger corridors have no legal protection and the Indian Ministry of Environment and Forests recently gave permission for coal mining development in a key forest corridor connecting two of the habitats in the study.
and a genetic bottleneck occurs dramatic human intervention is required to save isolated populations of cats from the perils of inbreeding.
#New species of carnivore looks like a cross between a house cat and a teddy bearobserved in the wild tucked away in museum collections
The olinguito (oh-lin-GHEE-toe) looks like a cross between a house cat and a teddy bear.
and mammals like the endangered Amur (or Siberian) tiger Asiatic black bear and wild boar. Listed as Endangered by IUCN Blakiston's fish owl is restricted to riparian areas in Russia China Japan and possibly North korea.
#Conservation efforts might encourage some to hunt lionsconventional wisdom holds that East Africa's Maasai pastoralists hunt lions for two distinct reasons:
to retaliate against lions that kill livestock or to engage in a cultural rite of passage.
Further some conservation initiatives including those designed to save lions from being hunted have failed either to work
or in some cases appear to have incited Maasai to hunt more lions as a form of political protest the researchers report.
because it's harder to control the hunting of lions unless society knows precisely why lions are hunted the researchers contend.
Many populations of Panthera leo--African lions--are falling and the species is classified as vulnerable on the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural resources'Red List.
Lion hunting is outlawed in Kenya and in Tanzania is limited to mostly tourists hunting with permits
unless the hunt is to eliminate a lion in defense of life or livestock. Still lion hunting regularly occurs in both countries usually without the hunters'following the law.
We saw an inaccurate representation of the exact reasons for why Maasai hunt lions and we had a lot of ethnographic background to correct that said Mara J. Goldman the assistant professor of geography at CU-Boulder who led the study.
Goldman collaborated with Joana Roque de Pinho a postdoctoral researcher at the Universidade T cnica de Lisboa Portugal
and Jennifer Perry a CU-Boulder geography alumna now studying law at the university. Goldman and her fellow researchers conducted 246 in depth interviews of Tanzanian and Kenyan Maasai between 2004 and 2008.
They found that Maasai hunt lions for multiple overlapping reasons some relating to predation on livestock and some not.
In some cases Maasai said they hunted lions to prevent the potential killing of livestock especially by lions that had killed livestock before rather than just as retaliation.
And while Maasai still celebrate successful lion hunts and the prowess of the warriors who hunt that cultural tradition can be less of a motivation to hunt than political discontent.
In Kenya for instance conservation programs aim to curb Maasai lion hunting by financially compensating Maasai for livestock killed by lions.
because the lion will keep coming back to eat cattle until all the cattle are gone. And then what will we do with the money?
In the beginning the elders kept the warriors from hunting lions the researchers found. But after Maasai representation in ranch governance was diminished the Maasai felt disenfranchised.
Lion hunting increased in frequency and severity and was discouraged no longer by elders the researchers said.
and social customs and most recently for their lion-hunting practices. Although the primary motivations for lion hunting differed somewhat between Tanzania
and Kenya the researchers emphasize that Maasai have multiple overlapping reasons to hunt lions: to reaffirm the protective role of young warriors to help select brave leaders among warrior groups to allow individual warriors to gain prestige to eliminate lions that prey on livestock
and to prevent lions from becoming habituated to eating livestock and sometimes harming people. The multiple reasons illustrate the limitations of explaining Maasai lion hunting as either a cultural manhood ritual
or a retaliatory act the researchers write. Participatory conservation interventions that respect Maasai knowledge and promote full engagement with management processes are likely to have far better success in persuading Maasai to change
or moderate such behaviors themselves the research team states adding that lion conservation projects rarely address such complex politics.
Goldman also a faculty research associate at CU-Boulder's Institute of Behavioral Science is the first author on the study that was published recently online in the journal Oryx
and is scheduled to appear in the journal's October print edition. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by University of Colorado at Boulder.
The tiny algae of the greenhouse world were just too small to support big animals said Norris. It's like trying to keep lions happy on mice instead of antelope;
lions can't get by on only tiny snacks. Within the greenhouse world there were rapid warming events that resemble our projected future.
what we know is effective in dogs cats and humans with lymphoma. Nemo's clinical signs soon resolved
#Dangers to biological diversity from proliferation of global cashmere garment industrya new study by the Wildlife Conservation Society and Snow leopard Trust reveals a disturbing link between the cashmere trade and the decay
The study finds that as pastoralists expand goat herds to increase profits for the cashmere trade in Western markets wildlife icons from the Tibetan Plateau to Mongolia suffer--including endangered snow leopard wild yak chiru saiga Bactrian camel
Ecological effects of the growth in goat herds include increasing conflicts with pastoralists predation by dogs on wildlife retaliatory killing of snow leopards and displacement of wildlife away from critical food habitats.
Joel Berger of WCS and University of Montana Bayarbaatar Buuveibaatar of WCS Mongolia and Charudutt Mishra of the Snow leopard Trust.
and wild yak Przewalski's horse chiru saiga antelope Tibetan gazelle kiang khulan and snow leopard are increasingly dominated by domestic goats and other livestock.
This study was supported by the Snow leopard Trust Trust for Mutual understanding National geographic Society Whitley Fund for Nature and The british Broadcasting company Wildlife Fundstory Source:
and apex predators such as leopards in order to maintain intact ecosystems in Central africa. Otherwise the loss of wildlife will result in a disastrous spiral of forest degradation that will reduce the storage of carbon and the resilience of rainforests to climate change.
So you end up with a cat warmer on your shelf. Koomey noted that the computing efficiency problem is exaggerated sometimes.
A previous study published last summer by the research team documented that rodenticides were being found in the tissues of the cat-sized weasel-like critters
A previous study published last summer by the research team documented that rodenticides were being found in the tissues of the cat-sized weasel-like critters
#Human activities threaten Sumatran tiger populationsumatran tigers found exclusively on the Indonesian island of Sumatra are on the brink of extinction.
and locations of the island's dwindling tiger population has been up for debate. Virginia Tech and World Wildlife Fund researchers have found that tigers in central Sumatra live at very low densities lower than previously believed according to a study in the April 2013 issue of Oryx--The International Journal of Conservation.
The findings by Sunarto who earned his doctorate from Virginia Tech in 2011 and co-researchers Marcella Kelly an associate professor of wildlife in the College of Natural resources and Environment and Erin Poor of East Lansing Mich. a doctoral student studying wildlife science and geospatial
environmental analysis in the college suggest that high levels of human activity limit the tiger population.
which could inform interventions needed to save the tiger. Tigers are threatened not only by habitat loss from deforestation and poaching;
they are also very sensitive to human disturbance said Sunarto a native of Indonesia where people typically have one name.
The smallest surviving tiger subspecies Sumatran tigers are extremely elusive and may live at densities as low as one cat per 40 square miles.
This is the first study to compare the density of Sumatran tigers across various forest types including the previously unstudied peat land.
The research applied spatial estimation techniques to provide better accuracy of tiger density than previous studies.
Sunarto a tiger and elephant specialist with World Wildlife Fund-Indonesia collaborated on the paper with Kelly Professor Emeritus Michael Vaughan
and Sybille Klenzendorf managing director of WWF's Species Conservation Program who earned her master's and doctoral degrees in wildlife science from Virginia Tech.
Getting evidence of the tigers'presence was said difficult Kelly. It took an average of 590 days for camera traps to get an image of each individual tiger recorded.
We believe the low detection of tigers in the study area of central Sumatra was a result of the high level of human activity--farming hunting trapping
and gathering of forest products Sunarto said. We found a low population of tigers in these areas even
when there was an abundance of prey animals. Legal protection of an area followed by intensive management can reduce the level of human disturbance
and facilitate the recovery of the habitat and as well as tiger numbers. The researchers documented a potentially stable tiger population in the study region's Tesso Nilo Park where legal efforts are in place to discourage destructive human activities.
The study--Threatened predator on the equator: Multi-point abundance estimates of the tiger Panthera tigris in central Sumatra--indicates that more intensive monitoring
and proactive management of tiger populations and their habitats are crucial or this tiger subspecies will soon follow the fate of its extinct Javan and Balinese relatives.
Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by Virginia Tech (Virginia Polytechnic institute and State university.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. Journal Reference e
#Comparing genomes of wild and domestic tomatoyou say tomato I say comparative transcriptomics. Researchers in the U s. Europe and Japan have produced the first comparison of both the DNA sequences and
After sequencing the L. gongylophorous genome the researchers noticed that the fungus seemed to be doing the lion's share of cellulose degradation with its specialized enzymes.
#Iberian lynx attacks on farm animals are on the risescientists working on the LIFE IBERLINCE project have spent six years studying the hunting behaviour of the Iberian Lynx lynx pardinus) registering a total of 40 attacks with 716 farm animals killed.
and reintroduction of the Iberian Lynx lynx pardinus) in Andalusia a team of scientists has spent six years monitoring lynxes'hunting habits in areas with nearby settlement.
In the eight years since this initiative began the number of lynxes in Spain has trebled.
Quite possibly when the lynx was present all over the peninsula these attacks were common but as they now have limited a very distribution
Compensation to farmersparallel to its conservation programme the group created a compensation scheme to mitigate the consequences of the conflict between humans and lynxes in this area.
Here lions leopards elephants hippos and giraffes wander free. Rivers of wildebeests zebra and Thompson's gazelles--more than 2 million all told--cross the landscape in one of the largest animal migrations on the planet.
and could be scavenged as even the largest African predators like lions and hyenas were unable to break them open to access their nutrient-rich brains.
and other habitats as a seed predator and disperser and it is a favorite prey of jaguars and pumas.
Dogs and cats require specific nutrients not ingredients. It is possible to meet nutritional requirements using a wide variety of nutrient sources.
Especially with cats it's very difficult. Cats do not self-regulate their food intake well
and have decided a preference for protein and fat. Swanson said it would be helpful to develop a model that would estimate the environmental impact of pet foods
A New zealand environmentalist has launched a campaign Cats to Go which aims to ban all cats from the country.
#Study of pumas in Santa cruz Mountains documents impact of predator/human interactionin the first published results of more than three years of tracking mountain lions in the Santa cruz Mountains UC Santa cruz
and colleagues with the UC Santa cruz Puma Project describe tracking 20 lions over 6600 square miles for three years.
Researchers are trying to understand how habitat fragmentation influences the physiology behavior ecology and conservation of pumas in the Santa cruz Mountains.
Lions are totally willing to brave rural neighborhoods but when it comes to reproductive behavior
In addition pumas give a wider berth to types of human development that provide a more consistent source of human interface such as neighborhoods than they do in places where human presence is more intermittent as with major roads
or highways the authors write. 37 lions capturedwilmers and his team which includes graduate students and a dog tracking team working with the California Department of Fish
and Wildlife have captured 37 lions to date. Twenty-12 females and eight males-were followed closely between 2008 and 2011.
Once captured and anesthetized the lions'sex was determined they were weighed measured fit with an ear tag and a collar with a GPS transmitter.
Researchers are able to track the lions'movements and calculate locations of feeding sites communication spots and dens.
Pumas communicate with scent markings known as scrapes where they scrape leaves or duff into a pile then urinate on it.
The Puma Project team set up and monitored remote cameras at 44 scrape locations and documented males and females which confirmed GPS data from the pumas'collars.
Researchers also found 10 den sites belonging to 10 different female lions. They visited 224 GPS clusters where activities suggested a feeding site and located prey remains at 115 sites.
Wilmers said the research is helping identify corridors where pumas typically travel between areas of high-quality habitat.
This includes neighborhoods where females often are willing to explore for food for their fast-growing brood.
when lions were struck by cars or caught raiding livestock. One male known as 16m was shown to have crossed busy Highway 17 between Scotts Valley and Los Gatos 31 times.
Eight of the 11 pumas that died during the study were killed when caught attacking domestic livestock.
Wilmers advised owners of goats or other livestock to consider keeping them in a fully-enclosed mountain lion-proof structure.
While Wilmers advised people to proceed with caution in any known mountain lion roaming grounds he said humans need not panic about the presence of mountain lions.
The study's conservation goals are meant to help lions survive in the midst of rapidly growing human development by building awareness of lions'behavior and providing safe transit opportunities under or over major highways.
'and a cat says'meow'Yoshimura says. We are interested in the mechanism of this genetically controlled behavior
and inhibiting the invasion of aggressive nonnative species including Scotch broom and hairy cat's ear.
African lions and villagers would benefit from fences to protect them from each other according to a new study by University of Minnesota researcher Craig Packer published online by Ecology Letters on March 5.
In an interview he called for an international Marshall Plan to erect fences where possible to protect people lions elephants
and wildlife from each other but without a massive increase in conservation funding nearly half of unfenced lion populations could decline to near extinction over the next 20-40 years.
And in the long run it would be more cost-effective to maintain lion populations in fenced reserves.
Fenced reserves maintained lions at 80 percent of their potential population capacity on annual management budgets of about $500 per square kilometer
Even though lion habitat has been reduced by at least 75 percent over the last century more still remains than can possibly be conserved said Packer a professor in the Department of Ecology Evolution and Behavior.
and zebra that could never be enclosed within a fenced reserve so the lions'last stand should be thought out carefully in terms of those places that can safely be fenced
and lions into much closer proximity the incidence of lion attacks on humans and livestock has increased substantially.
Not surprisingly villagers retaliate by killing lions to protect their families and their livestock. We must never lose sight of the fact that the costs of lion conservation ultimately derive from the need to protect people from these animals said Packer
And lions are not alone in causing widespread human misery. Elephants are in crisis too
and although they are largely being decimated by ivory poachers there's little support for elephant conservation in rural villages because of the enormous damage they cause to crops.
A fence that is lion-proof is also elephant-proof so a well-designed policy of fencing would protect more than just lions.
which is home to the largest remaining lion population in the world. Fencing the Selous
because fencing would protect humans as well as lions. Packer's own research has focused on lions in Serengeti National park for the past 35 years.
Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by University of Minnesota. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
and large cats faced with relentless human encroachment will seek sanctuary in the sultry thickets of mangrove
when keeping tabs on the distribution of threatened animals such as Sumatran orangutans and Javan leopards according to a recent Princeton university study in the journal Folia Primatologica.
and 20 felids (the large-cat family that includes tigers and leopards) known to divide their time between their natural forest habitats and some 47 swamp forests in Africa and Asia.
Because swamp forests often lack food sources fresh water and easy mobility few mammals are exclusive to these areas Nowak reported.
But the presence of endangered cats and primates in swamp forests might be overlooked seriously Nowak found.
Among big cats the Bengal tiger for instance holds its sole ground in Bangladesh in the Sundarbans the world's largest mangrove forest.
Species such as the crab-eating macaque and fishing cat can adapt somewhat readily to a life of swimming
and flat-headed cats have preserved their numbers --and where humans could potentially preserve them into the future.
Refuge Habitats for Primates and Felids was published in the journal Folia Primatologica. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by Princeton university.
If you're trying to understand how a population grows--say you are trying to keep a population of lions going--the first thing you need to know is how many lionesses you have
In addition albatross are threatened by invasive species such as rats and wild cats which prey on chicks nesting adults and eggs.
and away from other competing carnivores such as lions and the new study shows that the birds will go to considerable lengths to find food crossing multiple state boundaries with each bird on average ranging across an area twice the size of England.
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