Suchergebnisse

Agencies responsible for recovering populations of iconic mammals may exaggerate population trends without adequate scientific evidence. Recently, such populations were termed as "political populations" in the conservation literature. We surmise such cases are manifested when agencies are pressured to estimate population parameters at large spatial scales for elusive species. For example, India's tiger conservation agencies depend on an extrapolation method using index‐calibration models for estimating population size. A recent study demonstrated mathematically the unreliability of this approach in practical situations. However, it continues to be applied by official agencies in Asia and promoted further by global organizations working on tiger conservation. In this article, we aim to: (a) discuss the ecological oddities in the results of India's national tiger surveys, (b) contrast these survey approaches to known statistical approaches for large scale wildlife abundance estimation, (c) demystify the mathematics underlying the problems with the survey methodology, and (d) substantiate these arguments with results from India's national tiger survey of 2014. Our analyses show that the predictions of tiger abundance reported by the 2014 survey, and consequently on tiger population trends, are misleading because of the presence of high sampling‐based overdispersion and parameter covariance due to unexplained heterogeneity in detection probabilities. We plead for designing monitoring programs to answer clearly defined scientific or management questions rather than attempt to meet extraneous social or funding related expectations.

This book demonstrates how varying levels of human disturbance manifested through different management regimes influence composition, richness, diversity and abundance of key mammal, bird and plant species, even within ecologically similar habitats. Based on our results, we show the critical importance of the 'wildlife preservation' approach for effective biodiversity conservation. The study also provides examples of a practical application of rigorous methods of quantitative sampling of different plant and animal taxa as well as human influences, thus serving as a useful manual for protected area managers. Protected areas of various kinds have been established in India with the goal of arresting decline in, and to provide for, recovery of biodiversity and ecosystem services. A model that targets 'wildlife preservation' under state ownership is practiced across the country. However, forests in India are under intensive human pressure and varying levels of protection; therefore, protected areas may also experience open-access resource use, a model that is being aggressively advocated as a viable alternative to 'preservationism'. We have evaluated the conservation efficacy of alternative forest management models by quantifying levels of biodiversity under varied levels of access, resource extraction and degree of state-sponsored protection in the Nagarahole forest landscape of southwestern India

Chapter 1. The conservation issue -- Chapter 2. Development of hierarchical spatial models for assessing ungulate abundance and habitat relationships -- Chapter 3. Model-based assessment of ungulate-habitat relationships -- Chapter 4. Assessing threats to ungulates and management responses -- Chapter 5. Conservation of tropical forest ungulates: the way forward.