Animal cultures matter for conservation Brakes, Philippa; Dall, Sasha R X; Aplin, Lucy M ...
Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science),
03/2019, Letnik:
363, Številka:
6431
Journal Article
Poaching has devastated forest elephant populations (Loxodonta cyclotis), and their habitat is dramatically changing. The long-term effects of poaching and other anthropogenic threats have been well ...studied in savannah elephants (Loxodonta africana), but the impacts of these changes for Central Africa's forest elephants have not been discussed. We examined potential repercussions of these threats and the related consequences for forest elephants in Central Africa by summarizing the lessons learned from savannab elephants and small forest elephant populations in West Africa. Forest elephant social organization is less known than the social organization of savannab elephants, but the close evolutionary history of these species suggests that they will respond to anthropogenic threats in broadly similar ways. The loss of older, experienced individuals in an elephant population disrupts ecological, social, and population parameters. Severe reduction of elephant abundance within Central Africa's forests can alter plant communities and ecosystem functions. Poaching, habitat alterations, and human population increase are probably compressing forest elephants into protected areas and increasing human-elephant conflict, which negatively affects their conservation. We encourage conservationists to look beyond documenting forest elephant population decline and address the causes of these declines when developing conversation strategies. We suggest assessing the effectiveness of the existing protected-area networks for landscape connectivity in light of current industrial and infrastructure development. Longitudinal assessments of the effects of landscape changes on forest elephant sociality and behavior are also needed. Finally, lessons learned from West African elephant population loss and habitat fragmentation should be used to inform strategies for land-use planning and managing human-elephant interactions. La caza furtiva ha devastado a las poblaciones de los elefantes del bosque (Loxodonta cyclotis) y su hábitat está cambiando dramáticamente. Los efectos a largo plazo de la caza furtiva y de otras amenazas antropogénicas han sido estudiadas profundamente en los elefantes de la sabana (Loxodonta africana), pero el impacto de estos cambios sobre los elefantes del bosque del centro de África no ha sido discutido. Examinamos las repercusiones potenciales de estas amenazas y las consecuencias relacionadas para los elefantes del bosque del centro de África al resumir las lecciones aprendidas de los elefantes de la sabana y las pequeñas pablaciones de elefantes del bosque en el oeste de África. La organización social de los elefantes del bosque es menos conocida que la organización social de los elefantes de la sabana, pero la cercanía de la historia evolutiva de estas dos especies sugiere que responderán a las amenazas antropogénicas de maneras generalmente similares. La pérdida de individuos más viejos y con mayor experiencia en una población de elefantes causa disrupciones en los parámetros ecológicos, sociales y poblacionales. La reducción severa de la abundancia de elefantes dentro de los bosques del centro de África puede alterar a las comunidades vegetales y a las funciones del ecosistema. La caza furtiva, las alteraciones del hábitat y el incremento de la población humana probablemente estén orillando a las poblaciones de los elefantes del bosque hacia las áreas protegidas, e incrementado el conflicto humano-elefante, el cual afecta negativamente a su conservación. Alentamos a los conservacionistas a ver más allá de la documentación de la declinación de la población de elefantes del bosque y a enfocarse en las causas de esta declinación cuando se desarrollen estrategias de conservación. Sugerimos que se evalúe la efectividad de las redes existentes de áreas protegidas para la conectividad de paisajes de frente al desarrollo actual de industrias e infraestructuras. También es necesario realizar evaluaciones longitudinales de los efectos del cambio de paisaje sobre la organización social y el comportamiento de los elefantes del bosque. Finalmente, las lecciones aprendidas de la pérdida de poblaciones de elefantes del oeste de África y de la fragmentación del bábitat deberían usarse para informar a las estrategias de planeación del uso de suelo y de manejo de interacciones humano-elefante.
A key goal of conservation is to protect biodiversity by supporting the long-term persistence of viable, natural populations of wild species. Conservation practice has long been guided by genetic, ...ecological and demographic indicators of risk. Emerging evidence of animal culture across diverse taxa and its role as a driver of evolutionary diversification, population structure and demographic processes may be essential for augmenting these conventional conservation approaches and decision-making. Animal culture was the focus of a ground-breaking resolution under the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS), an international treaty operating under the UN Environment Programme. Here, we synthesize existing evidence to demonstrate how social learning and animal culture interact with processes important to conservation management. Specifically, we explore how social learning might influence population viability and be an important resource in response to anthropogenic change, and provide examples of how it can result in phenotypically distinct units with different, socially learnt behavioural strategies. While identifying culture and social learning can be challenging, indirect identification and parsimonious inferences may be informative. Finally, we identify relevant methodologies and provide a framework for viewing behavioural data through a cultural lens which might provide new insights for conservation management.
Descriptions of novel tool use by great apes in response to different circumstances aids us in understanding the factors favoring the evolution of tool use in humans. This paper documents what we ...believe to be the first two observations of tool use in wild western gorillas (Gorilla gorilla). We first observed an adult female gorilla using a branch as a walking stick to test water deepness and to aid in her attempt to cross a pool of water at Mbeli Bai, a swampy forest clearing in northern Congo. In the second case we saw another adult female using a detached trunk from a small shrub as a stabilizer during food processing. She then used the trunk as a self-made bridge to cross a deep patch of swamp. In contrast to information from other great apes, which mostly show tool use in the context of food extraction, our observations show that in gorillas other factors such as habitat type can stimulate the use of tools.
A globally rapid land use/land cover change (LULC) in human-transformed landscapes alters the interface of human-wildlife interactions due to shifting socio-ecological and environmental pressures. ...Understanding these shifts is crucial for mitigating repeated negative interactions that escalate conflict states between people and wildlife. This study aimed to understand LULC changes over 30 years (1989–2019), with more recent spatio-temporal patterns of high pressure at the human-elephant interface, and potentially underlying environmental and human-driven factors that affect elephant movement patterns. We analyzed a dataset of 923 human-elephant conflict occurrences, mainly crop foraging incidents, in the Enduimet Wildlife Management Area (EWMA) between the years 2016 and 2020 and combined these data with LULC for year 2019 to understand potential drivers of conflict and assess how agricultural land and settlement have increased over time. We further used GPS datasets of elephants collared between 2019 to 2020 to understand elephant movement patterns in changing land use types. Landsat image analysis revealed that 41% of the area had been converted into farmlands and settlements within the last three decades, which creates elephant-intolerant habitats and the potential to increase pressure at the human-elephant interface. Collared elephants using EWMA moved through all land use types and did not avoid settlements, although they moved through these at higher speeds, reflecting perception of risk. Elephants travelled slightly more slowly in farmland, likely reflecting the availability of foraging opportunities. Our analysis shows that human-induced LULC changes and the encroachment into elephant habitats have resulted in spatially and temporally predictable increases in HEC in EWMA, driven by the proximity of farmlands and protected areas (PAs), so that incompatible land uses are the principal drivers of damage to human livelihoods and increased risks to Tanzanian (and Kenyan) natural capital. Communities in Enduimet urgently need support to increase the effective distance between their farming activities and the PAs. Village-level crop protection and small-scale land-use planning around PAs are important first steps to halt an escalating conflict situation but need to be supported with longer-range strategies that separate incompatible land-use types and encourage the cultivation of alternative crops and livelihood diversification.
Global ecosystem change presents a major challenge to biodiversity conservation, which must identify and prioritize the most critical threats to species persistence given limited available funding. ...Mechanistic models enable robust predictions under future conditions and can consider multiple stressors in combination. Here we use an individual‐based model (IBM) to predict elephant population size in Amboseli, southern Kenya, under environmental scenarios incorporating climate change and anthropogenic habitat loss. The IBM uses projected food availability as a key driver of elephant population dynamics and relates variation in food availability to changes in vital demographic rates through an energy budget. Habitat loss, rather than climate change, represents the most significant threat to the persistence of the Amboseli elephant population in the 21st century and highlights the importance of collaborations and agreements that preserve space for Amboseli elephants to ensure the population remains resilient to environmental stochasticity.
Fission–fusion systems provide models for studying grouping decisions and social complexity in a range of taxa, as individuals act to manage risks and enhance reproductive success. African savannah ...elephants, Loxodonta africana africana, live in a fluid society where individual relationships persist over decades and affect reproductive success. Social structures have yet to be fully characterized for forest elephants, Loxodonta africana cyclotis. Aggregations at natural forest clearings, which are frequent in this subspecies, may offer social benefits in addition to nutritional resources. We examined the social functions of aggregations in Odzala–Kokoua National Park, Republic of Congo. We tested whether clearings function as ‘social arenas’ by examining how social opportunities affected the timing and duration of visits, and how short-term grouping decisions were affected by age, sex, group size and number of elephants present. Aggregations reflected a fission–fusion society similar to that observed in savannah elephants. Grouping patterns were largely unaffected by the number of elephants present, from which we infer that elephants were not acting to minimize competition. Social opportunities affected visit patterns such that visits were longer when others were present. Social opportunities were maximized by joining large groups, often including older elephants, or, for males, parties with females. Large and dynamically changing social groups in clearings offer potential for information exchange and the maintenance of social relationships. Demonstrating that fission–fusion operates in forest elephant society allows future research to focus on cost–benefit modelling, to understand the fitness consequences of these groupings.
► Forest elephant aggregations show fission–fusion similar to savannah elephants. ► Elephant visits increased by 50% when joining others. ► Elephants maximized social opportunities rather than minimize competition. ► Elephants often selected older partners, possibly for knowledge exchange.
•Energy-budget model of how individual elephants respond to changes in forage.•Population size and structure emerge from model outputs.•Predicts changes in population dynamics induced by climate and ...land-use change.•Can be adapted for other mammalian herbivores in grassland ecosystems.
Strategies for the conservation and management of many wild species requires an improved understanding of how population dynamics respond to changes in environmental conditions, including key drivers such as food availability. The development of mechanistic predictive models, in which the underlying processes of a system are modelled, enables a robust understanding of these demographic responses to dynamic environmental conditions. We present an individual-based energy budget model for a mega-herbivore, the African elephant (Loxodonta africana), which relates remotely measured changes in food availability to vital demographic rates of birth and mortality. Elephants require large spaces over which to roam in search of seasonal food, and thus are vulnerable to environmental changes which limit space use or alter food availability. The model is constructed using principles of physiological ecology; uncertain parameter values are calibrated using approximate Bayesian computation. The resulting model fits observed population dynamics data well. The model has critical value in being able to project elephant population size under future environmental conditions and is applicable to other mammalian herbivores with appropriate parameterisation.
Poaching has devastated forest elephant populations (Loxodonta cyclotis), and their habitat is dramatically changing. The long-term effects of poaching and other anthropogenic threats have been well ...studied in savannah elephants (Loxodonta africana), but the impacts of these changes for Central Africa's forest elephants have not been discussed. We examined potential repercussions of these threats and the related consequences for forest elephants in Central Africa by summarizing the lessons learned from savannah elephants and small forest elephant populations in West Africa. Forest elephant social organization is less known than the social organization of savannah elephants, but the close evolutionary history of these species suggests that they will respond to anthropogenic threats in broadly similar ways. The loss of older, experienced individuals in an elephant population disrupts ecological, social, and population parameters. Severe reduction of elephant abundance within Central Africa's forests can alter plant communities and ecosystem functions. Poaching, habitat alterations, and human population increase are probably compressing forest elephants into protected areas and increasing human-elephant conflict, which negatively affects their conservation. We encourage conservationists to look beyond documenting forest elephant population decline and address the causes of these declines when developing conversation strategies. We suggest assessing the effectiveness of the existing protected-area networks for landscape connectivity in light of current industrial and infrastructure development. Longitudinal assessments of the effects of landscape changes on forest elephant sociality and behavior are also needed. Finally, lessons learned from West African elephant population loss and habitat fragmentation should be used to inform strategies for land-use planning and managing human-elephant interactions. Las Consecuencias de la Caza Furtiva y el Cambio Antropogénico para los Elefantes del Bosque Resumen La caza furtiva ha devastado a las poblaciones de los elefantes del bosque (Loxodonta cyclotis) y su hábitat está cambiando dramáticamente. Los efectos a largo plazo de la caza furtiva y de otras amenazas antropogénicas han sido estudiadas profundamente en los elefantes de la sabana (Loxodonta africana), pero el impacto de estos cambios sobre los elefantes del bosque del centro de África no ha sido discutido. Examinamos las repercusiones potenciales de estas amenazas y las consecuencias relacionadas para los elefantes del bosque del centro de África al resumir las lecciones aprendidas de los elefantes de la sabana y las pequeñas poblaciones de elefantes del bosque en el oeste de África. La organización social de los elefantes del bosque es menos conocida que la organización social de los elefantes de la sabana, pero la cercanía de la historia evolutiva de estas dos especies sugiere que responderán a las amenazas antropogénicas de maneras generalmente similares. La pérdida de individuos más viejos y con mayor experiencia en una población de elefantes causa disrupciones en los parámetros ecológicos, sociales y poblacionales. La reducción severa de la abundancia de elefantes dentro de los bosques del centro de África puede alterar a las comunidades vegetales y a las funciones del ecosistema. La caza furtiva, las alteraciones del hábitat y el incremento de la población humana probablemente estén orillando a las poblaciones de los elefantes del bosque hacia las áreas protegidas, e incrementado el conflicto humano-elefante, el cual afecta negativamente a su conservación. Alentamos a los conservacionistas a ver más allá de la documentación de la declinación de la población de elefantes del bosque y a enfocarse en las causas de esta declinación cuando se desarrollen estrategias de conservación. Sugerimos que se evalúe la efectividad de las redes existentes de áreas protegidas para la conectividad de paisajes de frente al desarrollo actual de industrias e infraestructuras. También es necesario realizar evaluaciones longitudinales de los efectos del cambio de paisaje sobre la organización social y el comportamiento de los elefantes del bosque. Finalmente, las lecciones aprendidas de la pérdida de poblaciones de elefantes del oeste de África y de la fragmentación del hábitat deberían usarse para informar a las estrategias de planeación del uso de suelo y de manejo de interacciones humano-elefante.
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