Effect of the plantation age on the use of Eucalyptus stands by medium to large-sized wild mammals in south-eastern Brazil

Abstract

© iForest -Biogeosciences and Forestry IntroductionPatterns of wildlife distribution and abundance have suffered alterations worldwide due to human occupation and related activities (Tilman et al. 2001). The agriculture expansion has replaced the original vegetation and fragmented primary environments, thus affecting wildlife patterns of habitat use (Goodwin & Fahrig 2002, Fahrig 2003. However, studies in agricultural landscapes have shown the use of man-made habitats by the wildlife, such as coffee plantations in Mexico (Moguel & Toledo 1999), banana and coconut plantations in Costa Rica (Harvey et al. 2006, Harvey & González Villalobos 2007, cocoa and Eucalyptus plantations in Brazil (Faria et al. 2006, Lyra-Jorge et al. 2008) and subsistence agriculture in Nepal (Acharya 2006). A great spatial heterogeneity due to different strata and structural complexity exists in native forests, which results in a significant β-diversity (Moffett 2000, Parker & Brown 2000. In an agricultural landscape, a considerable loss of biodiversity occurs where monocultures are spatially more homogenous. However, the environment of Eucalyptus plantations varies dramatically along their commercial cycle. At the first stage, it assumes a bushy structure that later evolves into a forest, which is totally clear-cut at the end of 6-7 years (Turnbull 1995, Wagner et al. 2006. Therefore, these artificial forests present great temporal heterogeneity which may affect patterns of abundance and distribution of resident wildlife, not only for small mammals (Martin et al. 2012), but also for their predators (Verdade et al. 2011). In fact, recent studies show these forests are capable of maintaining a resident wildlife (Penteado 2006, Lyra-Jorge et al. 2008, Dotta & Verdade 2011, Martin et al. 2012). This study aims at assessing the temporal variation of the specific composition and relative abundance of middle to large-sized mammal species found in Eucalyptus plantations in the State of São Paulo, Southeastern Brazil.Eucalyptus plantations currently occupy over one million hectares in São Paulo, the richest and most developed state in Brazil. Their main commodities are the pulp and paper (ABRAF 2013). Together with livestock production, the ethanol agroindustry primarily based on sugarcane and the pulp and paper silvicultural industry primarily based on Eucalyptus are the main agroindustrial sectors of São Paulo state. However, unlike the other two agroindustrial sectors, pulp and paper industries follow Brazilian environmental laws relatively well, due to market pressure posed by certification organizations such as the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC -Verdade et al. 2012). Accordingly, the assessment of the distribution of middle to large-sized mammals in Eucalyptus plantations may give significant advances to both the environmental certification process of this sector and the elaboration of public policies which can result in the inclusion of such landscapes in the context of wildlife conservation. Materials and Methods Study AreaThis study was...

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Buffer zone use by mammals in a Cerrado protected area

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Uso de áreas agrícolas por Mazama gouazoubira (Mammalia, Cervidae) no Estado de São Paulo

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