National parks influence habitat use of lowland tapirs in adjacent private lands in the Southern Yungas of Argentina

Anna Pidgeon,Luis Osvaldo Rivera,Sebastian Martinuzzi,Natalia Politi,Silvia Chalukian,Sofia Bardavid,Soledad de Bustos,Leonidas Lizárraga,Volker Radeloff

doi:10.1017/s0030605319000796

Abstract

Abstract Protected areas are cornerstones of conservation efforts worldwide. However, protected areas do not act in isolation because they are connected with surrounding, unprotected lands. Few studies have evaluated the effects of protected areas on wildlife populations inhabiting private lands in the surrounding landscapes. The lowland tapir Tapirus terrestris is the largest terrestrial mammal of the Neotropics and is categorized as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. It is necessary to understand the influence of landscape characteristics on the tapir's habitat use to enable effective conservation management for this species. Our objectives were to (1) determine the potential distribution of the lowland tapir's habitat in the Southern Yungas of Argentina, and (2) evaluate the role of protected areas and other covariates on tapir habitat use in adjacent private lands. We used records of lowland tapirs to model the species' potential distribution and determined habitat use with occupancy modelling. Based on the covariates found to be significant in our models, we constructed predictive maps of probability of habitat use and assessed the area of potential habitat remaining for the species. Probability of habitat use was higher in the vicinity of two national parks and small households than further away from them. We found that in 85% of the lowland tapir's potential distribution the probability of habitat use is high (> 0.5). These areas are near the three national parks in the study area. The probability of detecting lowland tapirs increased with distance to roads. We conclude that national parks play a key role in the persistence of lowland tapir populations on adjacent private lands.

Highlights

Protected areas are set aside to conserve species and their habitats, and they are cornerstones of biodiversity conservation worldwide (Ewers & Rodrigues, )
We calculated the total area of potential habitat for the species in the study area and in each Tapir Conservation Unit, and the area of transformed land inside each Unit, by intersecting the potential distribution with the land-cover map
Habitat use by the lowland tapir on private lands adjacent to national parks was strongly negatively associated with increasing distance to national park borders in the Southern Yungas forests

Summary

Introduction

Protected areas are set aside to conserve species and their habitats, and they are cornerstones of biodiversity conservation worldwide (Ewers & Rodrigues, ). Private lands have long been recognized as essential for large mammal conservation (Simonetti, ; Hilty & Merenlender, ; Soares-Filho et al, ) because limitations in area and representation of habitats in protected areas can impede long-term conservation of populations and species. Increasing human populations, agricultural expansion and infrastructure development around protected areas reduce wildlife habitat, limit species movements, affect population source–sink dynamics and expose wildlife to anthropogenic threats such as hunting, poaching, invasive exotic species and diseases. These factors potentially limit the conservation value of protected areas

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