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Background Aedes aegypti is an important vector for arboviroses and widely distributed throughout the world. Climatic factors can influence vector population dynamics and, consequently, disease transmission. The aim of this study was to characterize the temporal dynamics of an Ae. aegypti population and dengue cases and to investigate the relationship between meteorological variables and mosquito infestation.MethodsWe monitored and analyzed the adult female Ae. aegypti population, the dengue-fever vector, in Porto Alegre, a subtropical city in Brazil using the MI-Dengue system (intelligent dengue monitoring). This system uses sticky traps to monitor weekly infestation indices. We fitted generalized additive models (GAM) with climate variables including precipitation, temperature and humidity, and a GAM that additionally included mosquito abundance in the previous week as an explanatory variable. Logistic regression was used to evaluate the effect of adult mosquito infestation on the probability of dengue occurrence.ResultsAdult mosquito abundance was strongly seasonal, with low infestation indices during the winters and high infestation during the summers. Weekly minimum temperatures above 18 °C were strongly associated with increased mosquito abundance, whereas humidity above 75% had a negative effect on abundance. The GAM model that included adult mosquito infestation in the previous week adjusted and predicted the observed data much better than the model which included only meteorological predictor variables. Dengue was also seasonal and 98% of all cases occurred at times of high adult Ae. aegypti infestation. The probability of dengue occurrence increased by 25%, when the mean number of adult mosquitos caught by monitoring traps increased by 0.1 mosquitoes per week.ConclusionsThe results suggest that continuous monitoring of dengue vector population allows for more reliable predictions of infestation indices. The adult mosquito infestation index was a good predictor of dengue occurrence. Weekly adult dengue vector monitoring is a helpful dengue control strategy in subtropical Brazilian cities.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13071-017-2025-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

In this study, we investigated what problems urban marmosets (Callithrix penicillata) face in a city environment through the analysis of responses to callouts (N= 348) made by the environmental police of Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil, in the period from 2002 to 2007. Our objective was to characterise the problems faced by the marmosets and human city dwellers. The environmental police responded to two types of callouts:(1) solicitation whereby a person called them to report a problem (N=218); and (2) the report of a hurt or injured animal (N=127). On average, one callout per week was made in relation to urban marmosets. We found no time of year effects in relation to callouts, or any effect of gender or age of the person making the callout (P>0.05). Furthermore, we found no environmental (e.g. percentage of "green area") or socioeconomical variables (e.g. salary levels) of the city's administrative regions associated with callouts (P>0.05). The majority of callouts resulted in the attempt to capture marmosets (N=345), and usually, only one animal was captured (N=309). Many of these animals were released into city forest fragments (N=146). Some sick animals were sent to veterinary clinics (N=25) whereas others or confiscated animals were sent to the government's wildlife processing centre (N=143). From this data, we were able to make a series of recommendation about how the management of urban marmosets could be improved.

To investigate the science of animal welfare for zoo and wild animals in the period from 1966 to 2007, we conducted a bibliometric analysis of abstracts downloaded from The Web of Science((c)) database using the keyword combination "Animal welfare, Zoo* and wild" in the topic field. In total we downloaded 1,125 abstracts, which were classified into the following categories: year of publication; environment of the study (e.g., zoo) or theoretical; area of knowledge (e.g., conservation in situ); number of experimental animals used; species; addresses of authors; taxonomic classification; publication language; journal name; number of citations received. Since 1990, there has been a rapid increase in the number of articles published in this area of animal welfare. One worrying result was that published articles were predominately of a theoretical nature (58.65%, N=563). Most of the articles were published by authors either in Europe (47.43%, N=480) or North America (37.65%, N=381) and written in English (87.71%, N=971). The majority of experimental studies were conducted with mammals (75.92%, N=391), and had small sample sizes (N=7 for zoo-based studies). In terms of impact factor (IF), the journals in this study had a median factor equivalent to that for the area of biological sciences (median IF=1.013). Little knowledge cross-over from farm animal welfare was found (only four articles) in this study. In conclusion, zoo and wild animal welfare as a science may benefit from a greater interaction with farm animal welfare.

Context. Primates are one of the most charismatic and widely studied vertebrate groups. However, the study of new world primates in green patches within urban areas has been neglected. Such primates have been viewed as a source of human-animal conflict; however, their ecological importance to urban ecosystems and their role in human well being is poorly understood.Aims. To increase understanding of both ecological and socioeconomical factors affecting the distribution, density and group sizes of urban marmosets in a large Brazilian city (Belo Horizonte).Methods. A map of vegetation cover and land use was produced and employed to investigate the distribution of marmosets. An online questionnaire was extensively publicised, which permitted the public to report the occurrence or not of marmosets near their residences. For sites with low salary levels and low internet availability, face-to-face interviews were conducted. Additionally, field surveys were conducted in 120 green areas identified by spatial analysis as potential areas of occurrence. The human population density, salary levels and green areas were posteriorly correlated with marmoset distribution.Key results. Despite the urbanisation and high human population density, green fragments within the city still housed marmoset groups. However, the presence of green areas did not always indicate primate presence. Group presence was significantly related to the size of parks or green areas and negatively related to built-up areas, and human density. Salary levels were related to more forested streets and possibly tolerance. Marmosets were classified as urban utilisers.Conclusions. The human-wildlife conflict with marmoset species was relatively low, owing to marmoset avoidance of built-up areas. The interaction of marmoset species and city dwellers was mainly limited to borders of forest fragments and inside city parks, and appeared to be human motivated.Implications. This study showed the importance of public involvement in wildlife studies in urban environments; clarifying the interaction between city dwellers and wild species is essential to mitigate negative interactions.