We assessed the importance of potential sources of mortality for the Vulnerable southern pudu Pudu puda in southern Chile using the clinical records of wildlife rehabilitation centres, necropsies of animals found in the field and a review of the diet of potential predators. To assess whether the identified mortality sources operate in nominally protected areas, we conducted a camera-trap survey in two areas to determine the presence of pudus and their potential predators. Predation by domestic dogs Canis lupus familiaris and car collisions were the commonest causes of pudu admissions to rehabilitation centres (35 of 44) and of deaths of animals encountered opportunistically in the field (seven of 14). Field data suggest that poaching could also be an important threat to pudus. Pudus were detected in both areas surveyed, accounting for 15.6% of mammal detections. Dogs accounted for 47.8% of all detections of potential predator species, followed by pumas Puma concolor (17.4%), guignas Leopardus guigna (17.4%) and chilla foxes Lycalopex griseus (17.4%). The literature survey implicated only pumas as important pudu predators among native carnivores. Our data suggest that, aside from forest loss, dogs, road kills and probably poaching are important concerns for pudu conservation. Our frequent detections of free-ranging dogs associated with roads within nominally protected areas suggest that long-term efforts to conserve pudu will require not only the protection of remnant native forest but also substantive environmental education to modify dog management near protected areas.
Effective wildlife management requires accurate and timely information on conservation status and trends, and knowledge of the factors driving population change. Reliable monitoring of wildlife population health, including disease, body condition, and population trends and demographics, is central to achieving this, but conventional scientific monitoring alone is often not sufficient. Combining different approaches and knowledge types can provide a more holistic understanding than conventional science alone and can bridge gaps in scientific monitoring in remote and sparsely populated areas. Inclusion of traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) is core to the wildlife co-management mandate of the Canadian territories and is usually included through consultation and engagement processes. We propose a status assessment framework that provides a systematic and transparent approach to including TEK, as well as local ecological knowledge (LEK), in the design, implementation, and interpretation of wildlife conservation status assessments. Drawing on a community-based monitoring program for muskoxen and caribou in northern Canada, we describe how scientific knowledge and TEK/LEK, documented through conventional monitoring, hunter-based sampling, or qualitative methods, can be brought together to inform indicators of wildlife health within our proposed assessment framework.
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