An overview of Brazilian mammalogy: trends, biases and future directions

Abstract

ABSTRACT. Mammals are among the most charismatic and well-studied organisms, and Brazil harbors the largest mammal diversity of the world. The Brazilian Society of Mammalogy was established in 1985, and since 2001 it organizes the Brazilian Congress of Mammalogy. We used the proceedings of all three editions of this congress together with papers indexed in Web of Science and Scielo to evaluate trends in Brazilian mammalogy. All contributions were categorized according to mammalian order, biome, topic of research and state of authors' affiliation. Our results show that mammalian orders with higher species richness receive more attention, but the ranking is different between abstracts and papers. Higher species richness did not translate into more attention for more speciose biomes, and again the ranking was different between papers and abstracts. There are research topics that receive much higher attention than others, and also other important ones, like Taxonomy, that have been neglected. States with greater human populations produce both more papers and abstracts. We conclude that the higher number of publication in the Atlantic Forest is caused by the concentration of mammalogists in the south and southeastern regions of the country. Contrary to what is normally believed, mammalian orders received attention according to their species richness, and not their charisma, probably because richer orders provide more study models. We suggest that additional funding mechanisms should be set in place in order to encourage more research on mammalian orders, topics, and states which have been neglected so far, in order to improve the knowledge on important Brazilian mammal biodiversity.

A Survey of mid and large bodied mammals in Núcleo Caraguatatuba, Serra do Mar State Park, Brazil

“…We would also expect to find carnivores such as jaguar (Panthera onca) and the crab-eating fox (Cerdocyon thous) plus at least one additional cervid species -the small brocket deer (Mazama bororo). Indeed, cervids highlight a remaining problem in neotropical mammalogy -uncertainty in species identification and classification (Brito et al 2009). We identified the cervid species (M. cf.…”

“…Although the characteristic "red-rump" of D. leporina was not apparent in the photo taken, further genetic studies are required to confirm the species identity within the Núcleo. Although predicting which species are likely to be detected is inherently speculative, these issues highlight that even though the Atlantic Forest is the most intensively studied biome for mammals in Brazil (Brito et al 2009), the knowledge necessary for effective conservation and management of Atlantic Forest mammals is far from complete.…”

“…The Atlantic Forest is the most intensively studied biome for Brazilian mammals (Brito et al 2009). The sampling intensity and availability of both published and un-published studies has enabled the establishment of priority areas for the conservation of mammals across the Atlantic Forest biome (Galetti et al 2009, Albuquerque et al 2011).…”

“…The sampling intensity and availability of both published and un-published studies has enabled the establishment of priority areas for the conservation of mammals across the Atlantic Forest biome (Galetti et al 2009, Albuquerque et al 2011). Yet these studies also highlight that there remain significant gaps not only in our understanding but also in the published data describing Atlantic Forest mammals (Brito et al 2009, Galetti et al 2009, Albuquerque et al 2011. With greater attention required for the development and dissemination of studies focusing on obtaining solutions to the management problems facing wild mammal species (Brito et al 2009).…”

“…Yet these studies also highlight that there remain significant gaps not only in our understanding but also in the published data describing Atlantic Forest mammals (Brito et al 2009, Galetti et al 2009, Albuquerque et al 2011. With greater attention required for the development and dissemination of studies focusing on obtaining solutions to the management problems facing wild mammal species (Brito et al 2009). …”