Status and conservation of the Endangered snow leopard Panthera uncia in Qomolangma National Nature Reserve, Tibet
| Autor: | Pengju Chen, Qiong Pu, Jian Xu, Huijian Hu, Jun Wang, Kun Shi, Yufang Gao, Cering Lhaba |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2016 |
| Předmět: |
0106 biological sciences
education.field_of_study business.industry 010604 marine biology & hydrobiology Panthera uncia Population Endangered species fictional_universe fictional_universe.character_species 010603 evolutionary biology 01 natural sciences Gross domestic product Geography Abundance (ecology) Environmental protection Snow leopard Livestock Physical geography Transect business education Ecology Evolution Behavior and Systematics Nature and Landscape Conservation |
| Zdroj: | Oryx. 51:590-593 |
| ISSN: | 1365-3008 0030-6053 |
| DOI: | 10.1017/s0030605316000284 |
| Popis: | Little is known about the status of the snow leopard Panthera uncia in Qomolangma National Nature Reserve, located on the northern aspect of Mount Everest in Tibet. To address this, during May–September 2014 we conducted line transects, camera trapping, household interviews, and socioeconomic statistics analysis. We surveyed 14 transects and located 287 putative snow leopard signs, with a mean density of 1.9 sign sites km–1, 3.8 signs km–1, and 1.4 scrapes km–1. We set 41 camera traps and recorded a minimum of seven individual snow leopards. Our results were comparable to snow leopard abundance estimates for neighbouring protected areas in Nepal. Semi-structured interviews with 46 (59%) households found that local people were generally supportive of snow leopard conservation, for a variety of economic, legislative, and religious reasons. The socio-economic situation in the Reserve underwent dramatic changes between 2000 and 2014. The human population increased by 28.9%, the livestock population decreased by 9.9%, the number of tourists in 2014 was 6.8 times greater than in 2005, and the local gross domestic product underwent an annual increase of 15%. We discuss the current threats to snow leopards, and recommend that more rigorous, comprehensive, and interdisciplinary research be undertaken to provide an evidential basis for the formulation of effective conservation policies and programmes. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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