Wildlife Management and Conservation Flashcards
What are wildlife management and wildlife conservation?
Management - seeks sustainable strategies linked to exploitation
Conservation - preservation of species and their habitat
What are the main methods of wildlife management?
Manipulative management - actively changing the size of a wildlife population (directly or indirectly)
- appropriate for populations that are harvested or those that increase/decline to unsustainable levels
Custodial Management - protective or preventative management, main goal is to minimise external influences on populations and habitat
- appropriate for management of national parks where goals are to protect ecological processes
- aids conservation of threatened/endangered species with external threats
What are the four ways in which a wildlife population may be managed?
1 - make it increase
2 - make it decrease
3 - harvest it for a continuing yield
4 leave it alone but monitor
What are the three decisions required following from the 4 wildlife management goals?
i - What is the desired goal?
ii - Which management option is therefore appropriate?
iii - What action is the management option best achieved
Who designed the object/action matrix? What are the 2 action sections divided into?
Norton 1988
Short Term Actions
Medium Term Actions
What are the 5 short term methods in the objective/action matrix?
1 - warn and advise farmers 2 - advise and provide credit 3 - advise and subsidise pesticides 4 - advise, subsidise and supervise spraying 5 - mass treat and charge farmers
What are the 4 medium term methods in the objective/action matrix?
6 - Mass treat at departments cost
7 - Intensive pest surveillance
8 - Implement area-wide biological control
9 - Training courses for farmers
What are the objectives oft the o/a matrix?
- Improve farmers ability to control pests
- Improve farmers incentives
- Strengthen political support
- Keep departments cost low
- Reduce damage
- Reduce further pest outbreaks
Who designed the feasibility/action matrix?
Bomford 1988
What is the conservation triage?
- The conservation/management triage is often described as a crisis discipline
- When faced with a scarcity of resources it is vital to maximise what is available
- Triage, meaning “to sort”
- Medical context - sorted by severity and recovery probability
- Management/conservation context - sorted by costs and long-term survival prospects
Who designed the application of triage in conservation and what are the main areas taken into account?
Bottrill et al., 2006 Values Success Cost Biodiversity benefit
What controversy surround the conservation triage?
Promotes defeatism - Far too easy to dismiss hard to treat species such as grizzly bears, tigers or jaguars
Accepting inevitability of extinction - By writing off seriously threatened species we may inhibit conservation science
Extinction risk is often a catalyst for scientific innovation- Triage inhibits science
Give an example of how ignoring the triage has been applied successfully
The California condor (Gymnogyphos californianus)
- historically scavenged across Southern and Western US
- Numbers declined due to deaths linked to poisoned carcasses to kill livestock predators
- Massive conservation effort that wouldn’t have been considered under triage frameworks
- Example of scientific advancement in the face of diversity
Why are triage processes often implemented?
Due to budget constraints
Give an example of the triage in action
Introduced rats threaten ground nesting birds on 5 islands
Islands valued for richness of ground-nesting birds
Manager sets goal to minimise the loss of endemic bird species
How is the biodiversity benefit calculated?
Expected biodiversity benefit = (Pr(success)bv)/cost
v = value of each species (phylogenetic diversity and is a measure of evolutionary distinctness)
Pr(success) = probability that action will eradicate all rats on the island, assuming no movement of rats between islands
b=0 - no eradication is implemented
b=1 eradication is implemented
What are the main points about the 4 parameters in triage decisions?
Values - Biodiversity associated values
- high value often very targeted
Probability of success - Successes should be prioritised
- Estimated from various data sources
Biodiversity benefit - the amount gained from the action
- greatest benefit should be prioritised
Cost - cheaper action should be prioritised
- consideration of prioritisation based fundamentally on costs and funds available
What types of tourism based managements are there?
National park networks
Outside park conservation
Non-consumptive tourism
Consumptive wildlife tourism
Main points on trophy hunting as a management tool
Most profitable of the consumptive wildlife tourism
Large and growing industry in Africa
As a result, wildlife as a land use justified over huge areas
What kind of money does trophy hunting bring in to Africa?
South Africa - $65-137 million/annum
Tanzania - $27-36 million/annum
Zimbabwe - $18.5 million/annum
Botswana - $12.5 million/annum
What is the controversy surrounding trophy hunting?
Animal welfare issues - e.g. fox/leopard/deer hunting using dogs
Ethical issues - e.g. canned hunting of lions
Social issues - e.g. inequitable distribution of revenues, inadequate involvement of communities, corruption
Ecological issues - e.g. setting quotes in absence of adequate data, overshooting of quotas
What limitations does trophy hunting have in conservation?
- Areas with no “touristic” species - less potential to derive income
- Focus towards trophies and not community benefit
- Non-huntable predator persecution?
- Introduction of exotic species?
- Low off-take rate with a focus on males
- High fees compared to conventional tourists
- Generates revenue in areas that are not generally suitable for tourism
- Trophy hunters maybe more likely to visit areas with political instability
Facts on Black Rhino
Black Rhino (Diceros bicornis)
Native to Eastern and Southern Africa
Generally solitary though strong mother-calf bond
Not very territorial and home ranges overlap
Considered aggressive and will readily charge
Highly threatened
What is the case for trophy hunting black rhino?
Scientific support - aggressive older bulls - improved female reproductive performance - inbreeding reduction Management support - valuable management tool - CITES accredited - Conservation Trust Fund for Namibia's Black Rhino received 100% sale price Funding support - helicopter surveys - ultrasound and translocation equipment - security equipment to combat poaching
