Public perceptions of jaguars Panthera onca, pumas Puma concolor and coyotes Canis latrans in El Salvador

Abstract

High human population density, histories of social conflict, environmental change and negative social attitudes are crucial issues for large carnivore conservation and reintroductions, which may be influenced by human age and gender, animal size and behaviour. Jaguars and pumas are extinct in El Salvador, but conservation and reintroduction schemes are debated across Central and South America. This paper examines public attitudes in El Salvador towards the extinct jaguars and pumas, and the fairly common coyote. One hundred and thirteen people were contacted and classified according to age and gender in San Salvador, La Union, Ahuachapan, Apopa, San Miguel and Santa Ana. The majority of people believed: in the toleration and removal of carnivores rather than shooting; in the introduction of jaguars and pumas into rural and special areas and zoos; that more animal protection was necessary; that the animals were good for human life, yet dangerous to children. Pumas were seen as the most dangerous, followed by jaguars and coyotes, but in most cases all three were seen as similar. Women were less tolerant of large carnivores, were more sensitive to negative impacts, and were more afraid of the animals than men. Younger people were more tolerant, and saw less danger to other animals and people, and were more supportive of animal reintroductions. Gender was irrelevant in the trapping and removal, and shooting of animals, protection levels, reintroductions and dangers to people and cattle. Age was irrelevant to animal protection levels, dangers to people and impacts on human quality of life. These findings are important for conservation policy and environmental geography. Lanjlouw P 2001 Nonfram employment and poverty in rural El Salvador World Development 29 529-47 Linnell J C, Aanes R, Swenson J E, Odden J and Smith M E 1997 Translocation of carnivores as a method of managing problem animals Biodiversity and Conservation 6 1245-57 Linnell J C, Odden D J, Smith M E, Aanes R and Swenson J E 1999 Large carnivores that kill livestock do 'problem animals' really exist? Wildlife Society Bulletin 27 698-705 Maehr D S, Noss R F and Larkin J L 2001 Large mammal restoration Island Press, Washington DC Michalski F, Boulhosa R L P, Faria A and Peres C A 2006 Humanwildlife conflicts in a fragmented Amazonian forest landscape: determinants of large felid depredation on livestock Animal Conservation 9 179-88 Ogra M and Badola R 2008 Compensating human-wildlife conflict in protected area communities: ground-level perspectives from Uttarakhanda, India Human Ecology 36 717-29

Gender and community-oriented wildlife conservation: views from project supervisors in India

“…This was illustrated by some respondents' explanatory comments, such as the project supervisor who suggested that gender issues are not relevant to projects concerned with specific wildlife species or to climate change. The respondent was not aware of the growing literature related to genderbased aspects of human-wildlife conflict (e.g., Treves et al 2006;Ogra 2008;Yang et al 2010;Campbell and Alvarado 2011) or climate change (e.g., Cutter 1995;Denton 2002;UNCSW 2008;Terry 2009). Increased levels of collaboration in scholarship and research between wildlife biologists and social scientists could help to address this research gap.…”

The status of artisanal fishing in El Salvador

“…The status of fishing in Central America is also much less studied than the Caribbean or South America [7][8][9][10][11]. This is especially the case for El Salvador, and to a lesser extent Nicaragua and Honduras, three countries sharing the vital international fishing grounds of the Golfo de Fonseca (Gulf of Fonseca) within the Central Pacific Region of Central America [12][13][14].…”

“…Livelihood diversification is a common coping strategy in response to declining fish stocks [3,11,29,32,33]. However, local researchers study large scale national level events, to the neglect of small-scale issues such as the socio-economic, cultural and environmentally based networks that enable and constrain local fishering activities [2,11,14].…”

“…km, population density 292 per sq. km) [19] is known for extreme environmental degradation and population density [14,[19][20][21][22][23][24][25]. However, few studies assess the vital but declining fishing industry [2,3,13,15].…”

Giant panda reintroduction: factors affecting public support

“…Reintroductions, especially of large mammals, are generally controversial due to human-wildlife conflict resulting from herbivore damage to crops, carnivore attacks on livestock or humans, land-use changes and vehicle collisions (Lindsey et al 2005;Nolet and Rosell 1998;Williams et al 2002;Yen et al 2015). Human-wildlife conflict often causes people to take a negative attitude toward reintroduced species and can greatly reduce the success rate of reintroduction projects (Campbell and Alvarado 2011;O'Rourke 2014;Wilson 2004). For example, a well-known failed reintroduction of eastern timber wolves (Canis lupes lycaen) in Michigan, USA during the 1970s involved all four wolves being killed because of strong opposition from livestock and hunting interests (Hook and Robinson 1982).…”