Combining local ecological knowledge and field investigations to assess diet composition and feeding habit of forest elephants in Campo-Maan National Park, Southern Cameroon

Abstract

Forest elephants are nocturnal and elusive animals, making it difficult to perform direct observations on them. Data on elephants' diet and feeding habit are lacking despite most forest elephants' habitats being lost to anthropogenic activities; yet such knowledge may be important for their conservation, particularly in a human dominated landscape. Local ecological knowledge and field investigations were combined to assess diet composition and feeding habit of forest elephants in Campo-Ma'an landscape. The study also aimed to evaluate the level of concordance between the two approaches. The study reports that forest elephants in Campo-Ma'an feed on 87 plants species, including crops. Twenty-two of these plant species were reported by both methods, most of them being potential drivers of humanelephant conflict as they are simultaneously used by humans and elephants. Also, field investigations revealed that, to satisfy their energy requirements, forest elephants relied mostly on leaves and fruits during the wet seasons and mostly on barks from trees during the dry seasons. Overall, the two methods appeared to be complementary, despite field investigations yielding fewer species, as we only covered the park partially. We suggest that combining both methods could be a cost-efficient way to address forest elephants ecological and management questions.

Exploring local ecological knowledge to inform the conservation of the Endangered and understudied Preuss’s monkey (Allochrocebus preussi) in Ebo forest, Cameroon

“…Information on local people's views, values and preferences for different conservation management interventions are increasingly gaining importance worldwide among conservationists and decisionmakers (Albuquerque et al 2021;Buchholtz et al 2020;Ochieng et al 2021). Local ecological knowledge is a robust and cost-effective method for gathering data from communities that live and interact with nature (Allendorf et al 2020;Brittain et al 2020;Djoko et al 2022), and useful to assess threats to wildlife (Albuquerque et al 2021;Buchholtz et al 2020;Haenn et al 2014) for the sustainable uti-lization and conservation of ecosystem services (Boafo et al 2016;Ens et al 2015;Mavhura and Mushure 2019;Nash et al 2016). It can equally provide important baseline information when there is a lack of scientific data, informing threats and impacts at a finer scale that can help inform management interventions (Corteés-Avizanda et al 2018;Cullen-Unsworth et al 2018;Nash et al 2016;Ternes et al 2023).…”