“But what silence! No more gazelles…”: Occurrence and extinction of fauna in Lesotho, southern Africa, since the late Pleistocene

Introduction

The pattern and causes of Permo/Triassic biotic crisis were mainly documented by faunal and terrestrial plant records. We reviewed herein the geomicrobiological perspective on this issue based on the reported cyanobacterial record. Two episodic cyanobacterial blooms were observed to couple with carbon isotope excursions and faunal mass extinction at Meishan section, suggestive of the presence of at least two episodic biotic crises across the Permian-Triassic boundary (PTB). The two episodes of cyanobacterial blooms, carbon isotope excursions and faunal mass extinction were, respectively, identified in several sections of the world, inferring the presence of two global changes across the PTB. Close associations among the three records (cyanobacterial bloom, shift in carbon isotope composition, and faunal extinction) were subsequently observed in three intervals in the Early Triassic, the protracted recovery period as previously thought, inferring the occurrence of more episodes of global changes. Spatiotemporal association of cyanobacterial blooms with volcanic materials in South China, and probably in South-east Asia, infers their causal relationship. Volcanism is believed to trigger the biotic crisis in several ways and to cause the close association among microbial blooms, the carbon isotope excursions and faunal mass extinctions in four intervals from the latest Permian to the Early Triassic. The major episodes of the well-known Siberian flood eruption are proposed to be responsible for the extinctions in the Early Triassic, but their synchronicity with the end-Permian extinction awaits more precise dating data to confirm. Geomicrobial records are thus suggestive of a long-term episodic biotic crisis (at least four episodes) lasting from the latest Permian to the end of the Early Triassic, induced by the global volcanic eruptions and sea level changes during Pangea formation.

The Temminck's pangolin ( Smutsia temminckii ) is one of eight pangolin species worldwide and the only pangolin present in southern Africa. Historically, pangolins have not been able to reproduce successfully in captivity and this may be in part due to the lack of knowledge and understanding with regards to the pangolin reproductive system (anatomy, physiology, biology) in all eight species. This original study describes the gross anatomy of the male Temminck's pangolin from three adult individuals investigated. The male Temminck's pangolin presented a short, conical penis with ascrotal (internal) testes, similar to many other myrmecophagous mammals such as the aardvark ( Orycteropus sp.) and anteaters (suborder: Vermilingua). However, the orientation of the penis of the Temminck's pangolin differed in that it was oriented cranioventrally, in contrast to the caudal orientation of the giant anteater. The testes were found to be bilaterally flattened with an elongate oval shape, similar to the aardvark. The specific characteristics of the reproductive tract of the male Temminck's pangolins are thought to be adaptations to their peculiar lifestyle as the male portrays characteristics that indicate adaptation to a lower basal metabolic rate and body temperature as well as to their defensive mechanism of rolling up into a ball. Our study suggests the male Temminck's pangolin reproductive anatomy is most similar and comparable to the Xenarthrans and the aardvark that display the same fossorial activities as pangolins, and the male morphology is not comparable to the phylogenetically closely‐related Carnivora.

Investigation on the spatial and temporal patterns of coupling sustainable development posture and economic development in World Natural Heritage Sites: A case study of Jiuzhaigou, China

Temminck's pangolin, Smutsia temminckii (Smuts), 1832 is a widespread mammal in eastern and southern Africa, and is the most trafficked animal in Zimbabwe despite enforcement of stringent laws and regulations. Nonetheless, there has been little research on the pangolins in Zimbabwe. The aim of this literature review was to assess some ecological aspects, population trends, socioeconomic and cultural complexities and conservation options for Temminck's pangolin in Zimbabwe. The review found that despite intense focus on poaching and trafficking threats affecting Temminck's pangolins, there were few attempts to assess the ecological behaviour and establish accurate population estimates and exact distribution inside and outside of protected areas. Furthermore, decades of economic meltdown in tandem with politically-driven land-use and land-cover transformations have disintegrated previously intact pangolin habitats, and societal and cultural endearment and reverence for pangolins in the country. Consequently, the lure of lucrative poaching and trafficking syndicates has outpaced law enforcement and usurped well-meaning conservation efforts, in the process threatening the pangolin population. Commercial pangolin farming for ecotourism, pangolin product substitution and explanatory and informative pangolin education awareness initiatives are new potentially viable, but unexplored future research, options for conserving pangolins in the country. It is recommended to use valid indirect methods for long-term assessment of the ecology, population trends and distribution of pangolins for sustainable conservation. Citizen science integration in developing a cogent National Pangolin Policy is vital to redress ecological and socioeconomic, cultural and political complexities threatening Temminck's pangolin conservation in Zimbabwe.

Due to their remoteness or boundless nature, activities at Natural Heritage Sites are difficult to monitor. In this study, two digital measures of the interest in Natural Word Heritage Sites are compared: one ex ante based on the number of Wikipedia page views of the site and another ex post derived from actual visitation as measured by the number of Instagram posts. The entire UNESCO database, which includes 248 Natural World Heritage Sites is linked to the 2.8 million Wikipedia page views, the 58 million Instagram posts and the Köppen extreme climate zone categories. Quantile regressions reveal that the main association in common for the two indicators is the risk of the site losing its inscription. Presence in the UNESCO Danger list is associated with reduced interest in a site, particularly in the number of Instagram posts and in the top quartile of Wikipedia views. Years since inscription is also an important explanatory variable, especially for the Instagram posts and the Wikipedia views in the top quartile. The UNESCO selection criterion of outstanding beauty only relates to the Instagram posts. Climate zone is mainly linked to the ex post variable and its upper quartile, where the sites with the most attention are found. Wikipedia views are also negatively associated with sites in Africa, the Arab countries and Latin America. Elevation, size of the area as well as kind of site are all variables not significant. There is a significant correlation between the two outcome variables with a coefficient of 0.5. While the Instagram posts relate clearly to actual visits, the Wikipedia page views is considered a possible leading indicator of future interest in a site.

The paper deals with the relationship between the presence of world heritage sites in a country and the volume of international tourist arrivals and international tourism receipts. World heritage sites are unique tourist attractions with enhanced attention paid to their protection, preservation and sustainability. The paper analyses whether the needs of sustainability can be harmonised with the requirements of a profitable and successful tourism sector, by statistical analysis of data about world heritage sites and tourism performance, for 129 countries of the world from 2014 to 2017. The results show that both cultural and natural world heritage sites are generally strong attractions for tourists and can contribute to increased arrivals and receipts. Cultural sites were found to have higher impact on arrivals, while natural heritage sites seemed to have more impact on receipts, which suggest, that visitors of natural world heritage sites are usually higher spenders, than tourists visiting cultural sites. Countries widely differ, however, in this respect by their geographical locations. Countries in Europe and Latin-America & the Caribbean region benefit most from cultural world heritage sites, while African, and North American countries experienced the benefits of natural world heritage sites more. The general level of development measured by per capita GNI also mattered for the less developed areas, but not so much for developed regions that possess a suitable level of infrastructure, health and education, and living standards.

Extinction in the Anthropocene.

Pangolins are the world's most trafficked non-human mammals. A significant number of Temminck's pangolins (Smutsia temminckii) are presented for veterinary care and rehabilitation in southern Africa. Little is known about the physiology and normal health of this species, making diagnosis and medical management difficult. This study aimed to establish reference intervals (RIs) for hematology and plasma clinical chemistry in the Temminck's pangolin. RIs were generated according to international guidelines using samples from 27 healthy free-living (n = 18) and rehabilitated (n = 9) pangolins. Hematology was performed using the Abaxis VetScan HM5 analyzer with manual differentials; clinical chemistry was performed using heparin plasma on the Abaxis VetScan VS2 and Cobas Integra 400 Plus analyzers. Hematology RIs were: RBC 3.88–8.31 × 1012/L, HGB 73–150 g/L, HCT 26–51%, MCV 59–72 fL, MCH 15.6–21.4 pg, MCHC 257–325 g/L, RDW 14.3–19.1%, WBC 1.80–10.71 × 109/L. Vetscan VS2 clinical chemistry RIs were: albumin 27–41 g/L, ALP 26–100 U/L, ALT 25–307 U/L, amylase 267–826 U/L, bilirubin 4–10 μmol/L, calcium 2.1–2.2 mmol/L, globulin 21–55 g/L, glucose 3.8–10.0 mmol/L, phosphate 1.3–2.6 mmol/L, potassium 3.6–5.9 mmol/L, sodium 132–140 mmol/L total protein 52–84 g/L, and urea 5.3–11.4 mmol/L. RIs for creatinine were not calculated as analytical imprecision exceeded analytical performance goals. Cobas Integra clinical chemistry RIs were: albumin 22–33 g/L, ALP 20–104 U/L, ALT 17–291 U/L, amylase 466–1,533 U/L, bilirubin 1–14 μmol/L, calcium 2.0–2.4 mmol/L, creatinine <58 μmol/L, globulin 23–49 g/L, glucose 3.6–10.1 mmol/L, phosphate 1.0–2.2 mmol/L, potassium 3.1–5.8 mmol/L, sodium 137–150 mmol/L, total protein 47–72 g/L, and urea 6.0–12.5 mmol/L. There was significant bias between the two chemistry analyzers for several measurands. Differences were found for some analytes between free-living and rehabilitated animals, probably reflecting differences in nutrition and hydration. These are the first RIs generated for Temminck's pangolin. These results will allow veterinarians to better determine pangolin health status, formulate optimal treatment plans and increase patient survival rates in this endangered species.

Throughout its range, Temminck's ground pangolin, Smutsia temminckii, is becoming increasingly threatened, predominantly as a result of anthropogenic pressures. This species is currently listed as Vulnerable in South Africa and Least Concern globally, although many assessment criteria are data deficient and thus hamper an accurate assessment of its actual status. Current knowledge of the threats faced by Temminck's ground pangolin largely stem from a handful of ecological studies and ad hoc observations. Here we synthesize data on the known threats faced by this species in southern Africa and highlight a number of new threats not previously recognized. The main threats faced by this species include electrocution on electrified fences, the traditional medicine (muthi) trade, habitat loss, road mortalities, capture in gin traps, and potentially poisoning. Electrocutions arguably pose the greatest threat and mortality rates may be as high as one individual per 11 km of electrified fence per year. However, the magnitude of the threat posed by the muthi trade has not yet been quantified. Most southern African countries have adequate legislation protecting this species, although implementation is often lacking and in some instances the imposed penalties are unlikely to be a deterrent. We propose mitigating actions for many of the identified threats, although further research into the efficacy of these actions, and the development of additional mitigating procedures, is required.

Habitat shrinkage, along with the loss of quality habitat, results in a higher human-wildlife conflict throughout the world. The Dibru-Saikhowa National Park of Assam once consisted of dense semi-evergreen forests, crane brakes, moist deciduous forests, and grasslands, now facing severe anthropogenic pressure that resulted in higher human-wildlife conflict. The study conducted in four suba (sub-village) of Laika and Dodhia villages found that wild buffalo was responsible for the highest degree of conflict (39.8%), followed by elephant 35% and wild boar 23.7% during 2016-17. The Pomuwa suba encountered the highest degree (94.6%) of human-wildlife buffalo conflict, followed by Tengabari suba 68.4%, Pasidiya 65.2%, and Rikbi 10.4%, which was found statistically significant between different subas (χ2=64.084, p≤0.05). A similar trend was also found in the case of human-elephant conflict, which was also found significant between different subas (χ2=83.829, p≤0.05). Although the extent of conflict was comparatively less, the Tengabari suba encountered the highest human-wild boar conflict and Rikbi suba human-leopard conflicts, which were also found to be statistically significant. However, crop depredation forms the major concern of human-wildlife conflict as compared to other kinds of conflict. The overall extent of conflict indicates that the Pomuwa suba is the highest sufferer as compared with other subas. A landscape-level policy and its proper execution along with timely disbursement of ex-gratia may help in mitigating human-wildlife conflict.

Archaeological engagements with historic Christian mission stations have increased significantly since the late 1990s, but in joining the established dialogue between historians and anthropologists about mission pasts in southern Africa, the distinctive contribution offered by archaeological approaches has not always been recognized. Interdisciplinary conversations have at times focused on excavation, archaeology’s most distinctive method, and the material evidence this uncovers, without recognizing the distinctive ways of thinking and working that archaeologists have developed to understand the past on the basis of its material traces. Through an engagement with the material world as it exists in the present, archaeologists develop understandings of the past that form the basis of new narratives. This is a form of engagement shared with others, including local and family historians, and on which many people’s engagements with museums and heritage sites are based, including a number of museums and heritage sites based in and around historic mission sites in southern Africa. Engaging the traces and remains of missionary pasts in this way, whether through places, artifacts, images, or texts, has the potential to reveal traces of ways of acting, thinking, and being that were not recognized or understood within the textual sources upon which many early 21st-century understandings of southern Africa’s missionary past have been built. This form of engagement, overlapping as it does with the projects of enthusiasts and nonprofessional scholars, has the potential to generate new stories that can become the basis of new interpretations at heritage sites and museums. As places that were not the exclusive preserve of any single racial or ethnic group, Christian missions have the potential to allow stories to be told that include a range of forms of historical engagement, from displacement and refuge, to slavery and emancipation in the Cape, from collaboration and conflict in the face of expanding colonial frontiers, to tension, negotiation, and compromise between missionaries and African leaders both within, and beyond, formal colonial boundaries. Missionary pasts exemplify histories of racial mixing as well as segregation, and provide a glimpse into the multiple ways in which a range of future-oriented political and religious projects were imagined and manifested, but also frequently failed. Christian missions are boundary objects, with the potential to constitute borderlands where a range of academic disciplines, but also nonacademic projects, can come together to develop new ways of making sense of the past in as yet undetermined and potentially transformative ways. In an expansive and globally comparative mode, the archaeology of Christian missions has the potential to illuminate some of the ways in which Christianity itself has been remade in southern Africa, but also remade as southern African, since the early 19th century.

Threats to the survival of wild primate population have greatly increased. Most primate populations today face ongoing habitat disturbance, yet not all species respond to disturbance the same way, while many primate species experience declines in population density. There is no much information on the population status and density of primates in Zengmewerweria forest area. Their for study on the Population status, density, and habitat use of non-human primates and cause of human-wildlife conflict was carried out in Zengmewerweria forest area, Ankober district, north- eastern Ethiopia conducted from September 2018 to December 2020. Aim of this study was to provide information on population status, density and habitat use of non-human primate and human-wildlife conflict in the forest. Total counting method was used to collect data on the population status of non-human primates in six counting blocks. Questionnaire and group discussion were used to collect data about human-wildlife conflict as well as to assess the attitude of society about wildlife. Data were analyzed using SPSS software. Only two species of non-human primates Grivet monkey (Chlorocebus aethiops) and Black and white colobus (Colobus guereza) were identified in the forest. The total populations of Colobus guereza were 44 and 36 individuals during the dry and wet seasons respectively. There was no significant seasonal difference between seasons (χ2=1.3, df=1, P > 0.05). Similarly the total number of grivet monkey recorded during the dry season was 140 and the wet season was 117 and there was no a significant difference in the number between seasons (χ2=2.6, df=1 P > 0.05). The average density of grivet monkey and colobus was 39.67 and 12.35 individuals per kilometer square respectively. Illegal expanding for farming and illegal resource use, loss of wildlife habitat, increasing deforestation and overgrazing were the major problems encountered in the study area. Therefore, Woreda Administration should work a lot with the community to limit negative activities and protect the Forest. Furthermore, different conservation measures should be taken to increase the number of primates.

The continued decline of long‐distance ungulate migrations threatens to decouple important ecological processes that increase biodiversity and wildlife abundance. Past research has focused on preserving migration paths where habitat fragmentation and loss disrupt movement corridors. However, shifting residency‐migration trade‐offs are the stronger driver of migration loss in some populations. Suburban residential developments may provide ungulates with anthropogenic food sources and refuge from predators, which can increase population growth among short‐distance migrants relative to long‐distance migrants. This trend can increase wildlife vehicle collisions and other human–wildlife conflicts while simultaneously reducing hunting opportunities. Yet, individual animals vary in their tolerance of human disturbance. We investigated how interindividual variation relative to conflict and human habituation influences elk migration and space use on shared winter range. We used a clustering algorithm applied to GPS collar data to identify elk use of anthropogenic food resources in suburban habitat. Cluster locations identified all known anthropogenic subsidy locations during the study period. Elk that used suburban anthropogenic food sources also migrated 60% shorter distances between summer and winter ranges than elk with no known use of these food subsidies. Elk use of protected wintering grounds was spatially structured such that conflict‐prone, short‐distance migrants disproportionately used areas with more human activity. Clustering algorithms applied to GPS collar data may allow managers to identify foci of concentrated use that generates human–wildlife conflict, and where prion deposition and environmental contamination facilitate the spread of chronic wasting disease, particularly in suburban areas with anthropogenic food subsidies. The apparent spatial structuring of shared winter range according to the conflict potential and migration strategy of individual elk may also permit managers to assess relative recruitment among cryptic population segments using different migration strategies and facilitate targeted, adaptive management actions. These associations between conflict, human habituation, and migration shed light on the urbanization of wildlife species, inform efforts to manage human–wildlife conflict and disease spread, and emphasize that a multipronged approach beyond maintaining habitat corridors may be necessary to conserve long‐distance migrations for species that can become human‐habituated.

Land-use changes and the expansion of protected areas (PAs) have fostered increased interactions between humans and wildlife, resulting in an escalation of human-wildlife conflict (HWC) globally. However, HWC spatiotemporal pattern variation and its associations with PAs and land-use change remain poorly understood. To address this knowledge gap, we mapped and analyzed HWCs from 1990 to 2022 across China. We comprehensively mapped the spatiotemporal dynamics of HWCs in ArcGIS with data sets stratified by county, year, and species; assessed the impact of PAs through propensity score matching; and analyzed the effects of habitat transformation with linear mixed models. As PA increased from 0 to 20,000km2, the likelihood of HWCs initially increased (50%) before declining (20%). Conversely, as the distance from a PA grew, the likelihood of HWC gradually decreased (0 beyond 65km). There was a temporal lag between the establishment of a PA and the occurrence of HWC. Habitat loss catalyzed HWCs, whereas decreased levels of habitat fragmentation sometimes initially caused a temporary increase in HWCs. In general, the distribution of PAs greatly affected HWC occurrence, and habitat loss and fragmentation were critical drivers of HWCs, both of which exhibited time-lagged effects. HWC has become more challenging to address as conservation initiatives have led to significant recovery of the habitats and populations of wild animals. Further measures to address the HWCs are needed to ensure the preservation of animal welfare while fostering the mutually beneficial coexistence of humans and animal species. Finally, our study provides an important starting point for informing future HWC research and conservation planning on a global scale.