Walking for Tiger Conservation: An Occupancy Survey of the Satpura-Melghat Tiger Corridor

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What is a corridor?

In the sphere of conservation biology, a wildlife corridor is a strip of habitat that connects two wildlife source populations and serves as a movement path for wild animals in search of resources such as food, habitat and mates. In a larger landscape, consisting of many source populations, one can have a network of corridors, connecting pairs of source populations so that they are connected directly or indirectly. Together these populations constitute a metapopulation.

For several … Read More

Forging Linkages Across Regions for the Wide-ranging Asian Elephant

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Connectivity across habitats and animal populations is critical to conservation. Connectivity is forged by animal movements – or dispersal – across large heterogeneous landscapes. Connectivity boosts the ability of animals to persist over time, and enhances both immunity and adaptability of animal populations, and helps prevent local extinctions. When local extinctions do occur, connectivity allows animals to recolonise previously occupied but currently empty or depauperate habitats.

Today, habitats are sometimes severely fragmented, and human presence has drastically restricted animal movement. … Read More

Mind the Gap: Connectivity Conservation for Dholes in India

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The increase in human-driven impacts on the natural world continues to threaten the survival of several species of wildlife. Many endangered species that currently survive in small populations across isolated habitats are particularly vulnerable. It is important to not only conserve these small populations but also enable movement of individuals between them. Facilitating ‘connectivity’ of populations and habitats is therefore a key conservation issue. The Asiatic wild dog (dhole) is one of many endangered species that can benefit from connectivity … Read More

Conserving the Dhole in Karnataka’s Western Ghats

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The Asiatic wild dog or dhole (Cuon alpinus) is pack-living apex predator found in south and southeast Asia, currently threatened with endangerment. Dholes are generally restricted to protected forest habitats, but also occur in reserve forests and production agroforests (like tea and coffee plantations). The recent IUCN Red List assessment suggests that there may be 1000–2000 adult, mature dholes left in the wild. Despite its precarious status, the dhole remains one of the least studied large carnivores in the world. … Read More

Connecting the Tigers — Mapping Habitat Connectivity for Tigers in Central India

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It turns out that – when it comes to protecting India’s tigers – size matters, just not in the way most people might think. Large protected areas are clearly important for such a wide-ranging, territorial species. But in what may be a somewhat counter-intuitive finding, new research also shows that small protected areas often play a disproportionate role in ensuring the long-term survival of tigers in Central India.

Over the last several years, India has been working to improve tiger … Read More

Conserving Species in Landscapes Requires Holistic Planning

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Today, a number of endangered species persist in fragmented landscapes. These landscapes house pristine forests (or other habitat), alongside degraded forests, agricultural lands, plantations, settlements and other lands under different forms of human use. These lands can range from the more ‘wildlife-friendly’ coffee plantations, to open lands or human settlements that are relatively less used by wildlife.

Protection of species and habitat within reserves is without doubt a cornerstone of conservation. But when zooming out to landscapes, conservation challenges, as … Read More

Gibbons in Our Midst: Informing Connectivity Conservation

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Authors Divya Vasudev and Robert J. Fletcher highlight the importance of using data of animal movement to infer connectivity. Below are the highlights of their study appearing in Biological Conservation (Volume 181) in January 2015.

A flash of black in the trees makes me stop. I am not sure if it is the softness of the black that differentiates it from the shadows. Perhaps it was a movement, uncoordinated with the swaying of the branches with the wind. For a … Read More