Abstract
Understanding the effects of land cover change on wildlife distribution is very important for resource management and conservation planning. This paper aimed at detecting the effects of land cover change on great apes distribution at the Lobéké National Park and its bounded forest management units (FMUs). Data on great ape nests were collected in the field for the years 2001 and 2014 through distance sampling with line transects. Landsat TM images of South-East Cameroon for the years 2001 and 2014 were acquired from earth explorer and corrected atmospherically for proper visualization. An area of interest comprising the Lobéké National Park and its FMUs was extracted for classification and change detection. A comparison in great apes nest distribution and change per land cover change category was done for both years through point pattern analysis, whereas a time series analysis of the detected land cover change impacts on great apes nest distribution for a period of 13 years was modeled using logistic growth and regression equations in Vensim 7.2. The results could illustrate that, as land cover changes from one cover type in 2001 to another in 2014, increases or decreases in great apes nests were observed within each changed area.
Highlights
In Cameroon, two species of great apes exist namely: chimpanzees and gorillas
In Cameroon as well as in other African countries, the driving forces or causes of land use and land cover change are connected to deforestation, subsistence farming with poor land use practices, mining, infrastructural development and rapid urbanization which intend alters the habitats of most wildlife species and as a consequence, contributes immensely to the devastating effects of climate change
1.2% forests were gained in the park as compared to 2.9% gained in the forest management units (FMUs)
Summary
In Cameroon, two species of great apes exist namely: chimpanzees and gorillas. Chimpanzees are of two subspecies: Pan troglodytes troglodytes and Pan troglodytes ellioti. Subsistence farming on the other hand is linked with increase demand for agricultural products due to increase human population, while rapid urbanization and infrastructural development are caused by the continuous growth in the continent’s population These human induced problems are constantly causing serious threats to protected areas at large causing loss in wildlife corridors which may in turn lead to genetic drifting and inbreeding of species while negatively impacting population stability and distribution and to a greater extent loss in ecological integrity, extinction, as well as increase in human-wildlife conflict[19,20]. (a) We classified and analyzed the changes in Land cover types that have occurred at the study areas within the course of 13 years (2001–2014)
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