Peccaries and their relationship with water availability and their predators in Calakmul, México

Abstract

A reduction in the frequency of rainfall and an increase in drought periods, as a consequence of climatic change, has caused the desiccation of water ponds (locally known as “aguadas”) in the Calakmul region. The objective of this study was to determine if the abundance and distribution of the white-lipped peccary, Tayassu pecari, and the collared peccary, Pecari tajacu, in the ponds of the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve, a tropical forest in Southern México, are related to water availability and to the presence of their predators throughout five years of study. Using photo-trapping technique, 12 aguadas were monitored. The index of abundance of photographic records and the activity patterns were estimated, and the presence of both species of peccaries was related through linear and logarithmic regressions with the availability of water and their predators (pumas and jaguars). The abundance and presence of the white-lipped peccary and the jaguar were directly related to decreasing water availability, while water was not a determining factor for the presence of the collared peccary and the puma. The decrease in the availability of water in the aguadas of the reserve has become a serious threat to the white-lipped peccary, one that, when coupled with other threats such as hunting and fragmentation of their habitat in the communities surrounding the reserve, will increase the risk of extinction of these populations, that at least for the white-lipped peccary, is the most important in Mesoamerica.