Rapid assessment of nonvolant mammals in seven sites in the northern State of Pará, Brazil: a forgotten part of the Guiana Region

Abstract

The Guiana Center of Endemism (GCE) extends across Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana, north of the Amazon River and east of the Negro River in Brazil, and Venezuela to the south of the Orinoco River. Regarding diversity of nonvolant mammals, the Brazilian part of this center is less studied, especially the area corresponding to the north of the State of Pará. Seven field trips lasting 12–15 days each were conducted in five conservation units in northern Pará, in order to assess the nonvolant mammalian fauna. Small mammals were captured using conventional and pitfall traps. Medium-sized and large mammals were recorded through direct observations on diurnal transect censuses, collections, camera traps, indirect evidence, and in some cases, interviews. We recorded 60 species distributed in nine orders. Among other contributions, a recently described species of

First confirmed record of the Guianan White-eared Opossum, Didelphis imperfecta Mondolfi & Pérez-Hernández, 1984 (Didelphimorphia, Didelphidae), from Colombia

“…1). On the other hand, D. albiventris has a wider distribution in South America, since is located in the Chaco biogeographic region, the Atlantic forests of Argentina, and open deciduous forests of Paraguay, Uruguay, Bolivia, and the center and south of Brazil (Cerqueira 1985;Voss and Emmons 1996;Ventura et al 2002;Cerqueira and Tribe 2008;da Silva et al 2013;Astúa 2015;Faria and Melo 2017;Rossi et al 2017); Our results agree with those descriptions and distribution ranges; hence, it supports the identification of D. imperfecta and confirms its presence in the tropical lowland forests around of the Orinoco river in Colombia.…”

“…Lower left: study area within the El Tuparro NNP. Upper left: D. imperfecta Mondolfi & Pérez-Hernández, 1984 reported geographical distribution according to the IUCN (polygon) (Pérez-Hernández et al 2016); black dots correspond to species locations taken from The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) and those reported by Ventura et al (2002), Caramaschi et al (2013), da Silva et al (2013), Barros Faria and Melo (2017), and Rossi et al (2017). Right: locations of plots within study area; D. imperfecta was captured in plot 3, the image corresponds to a true color combination of a Landsat image.…”

Rapid ecological assessment of mammals from a locality of middle basin at Palmar River, Zulia state, Venezuela

“…The first step for studying biodiversity is the assessment of species richness -and its space and time dimensions-given that this information represents the most important knowledge resource for developing systematic conservation planning; including its management and monitoring (Sánchez et al 2004, Martins et al 2016. In this sense, information regarding presence/absence, abundance and diversity of species, especially mammals, has been fundamental for further understanding other important ecological parameters such as population dynamics, communities' structure and ecological processes (e.g., dispersion, pollination), as well as to identify and assess biodiversity loss (Voss & Emmons 1996, Wright et al 2000, Prieto-Torres et al 2011, Martins et al 2016.…”

“…Each transect had 36 Tomahawks, 36 Sherman and 36 blows traps, 10-15 m apart, alternately arranged. The traps were baited with a mixture made of peanut butter, sardines, and cornmeal (Tirira 1998, Rossi et al 2016. These were checked daily in the morning, and all captured individuals were collected.…”

How many species of mammals are there in Brazil? New records of rare rodents (Rodentia: Cricetidae: Sigmodontinae) from Amazonia raise the current known diversity

“…Reports of environmental impacts studies and environmental monitoring programs before, during, and after the construction as well as during the operation of these enterprises produced short and long-term mammal surveys (sensu Voss & Emmons, 1996 ), and hundreds of specimens were assembled and deposited at large and traditional, as well as small and new, Brazilian scientific collections. As a consequence of these efforts, new species (e.g., Bonvicino, Casado & Weksler, 2014 ; Moratelli & Dias, 2015 ; Pavan, 2015 ; Christoff et al, 2016 ; Pardiñas et al, 2016 ), and new distributional records throughout Brazilian states (e.g., Louzada et al, 2015 ; Abreu-Júnior et al, 2016 ; Rossi, Miranda & Semedo, 2016 ; Braga & Duda, 2017 ; Percequillo et al, 2017 ) have been produced, on a yearly basis. It is noteworthy, but not unexpected, that several of these novelties are from representatives of the Order Rodentia, mainly on the cricetid subfamily Sigmodontinae, one of the most speciose lineage of mammals in the world ( D’Elía & Pardiñas, 2015 ).…”