Gobi bear abundance and inter-oases movements, Gobi Desert, Mongolia

Abstract

Abstract Brown bears (Ursus arctos) inhabit much of the northern hemisphere, including portions of North America, Europe, and Asia. Whereas northern populations generally are healthy, their distribution becomes fragmented and conservation status more tenuous in their southern range. Many fragmented populations across southern Asia are poorly understood, and abundance and distribution data are minimal. One such population contains the Gobi bear, a brown bear surviving in the Great Gobi Strictly Protected Area of southwestern Mongolia. The number of bears in this area was assumed to be low, without data-based abundance estimates. Whereas bears frequent 3 oases complexes, it was not known to what extent bears moved or bred among these complexes, which span approximately 300 km. As part of a larger science-based conservation effort, we conducted a DNA-based mark–recapture population survey in 2009 to estimate abundance, inter-oases movements of individual bears and geneflow, and genetic variability. We placed...