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Status, Habitat And Conservation Of Main Ungulates In Cibagou National Nature Reserve Of Tibet, China

Posted on:2006-06-28Degree:DoctorType:Dissertation
Country:ChinaCandidate:P J WuFull Text:PDF
GTID:1100360152993097Subject:Ecology
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Cibagou Nature Reserve lies in southeast Tibet, which terrain is characteristic of high mountains and deep valley, and which climate is warm and rainy, and what's more, its temperature takes on an obvious vertical change. Complicated terrain and rainy climate give birth to the great richness of species and abundance of plant vegetation type. It contents abundant animals belonging to different faunas, and the ungulates in the reserve amount to 9, and most of them are protected species by the State. However, there had been only two preliminary surveys in the area by 2001, and it had been lack of systematic research on these animals in the reserve.To understand the status, ecology and conservation of the ungulates, especially habitat selection and interspecific relationship, we conducted one-year survey in the Cibagou Nature Reserve of Tibet from August 2001 to July 2002. From August to November 2001, transects were set to observe the behaviors of takin and other ungulates, and in addition to these, observations were made during the study on habitat of takin and serow. Size of ungulates, grouping type, time, place, altitude and vegetation type were recorded. From November 2001, 14 transects perpendicular to contours were set randomly along the Cibagou valley from south (the entrance of Cibagou Nature Reserve) to north of the reserve, and a total of 187 sampling plots (10m × 10m) were set every 250m from the bottom to upper position. For each plot, we recorded the variables including vegetation type, altitude, slope degree, slope aspect, slope position, distance from water, arbor density, shrub density, bamboodensity, shelter, canopy cover. Plots were checked to examine if any recent tracks (including pellets, footprint, bedding sites, etc) left by the animals in winter, spring and summer and to decide if used by takin or serow. In the spring, we checked the new tracks left by all the ungulate in 10m wide along the transect set already, and identified the species and noted the altitude, vegetation type, slope position and other variables of the sites of the new tracks. In this study, some methods including questionnaire, interviewing and information collecting were used to study hunting on and conservation of these ungulates. Vanderloeg coefficient & Scavia index was used to evaluate the selectivity of vegetation and other variables for takin and serow, and the discriminant analysis was used to analyze seasonal and interspecific change of habitat selection, and the Mann-Whitey U was used to test the difference of two variables of non-parameter. In analyzing interspecific relationship, interspecific association test, the discriminant analysis and ecological theory and correlative measurement were used.The conclusions of the study are listed below as:1. There are 9 species of ungulates in Cibagou Nature Reserve, which are takin, serow, black musk deer, forest musk deer, goral, red goral and blue sheep. For the classification of the muntjac, but based on the result of the molecular research, we identified it as black muntjac. Among all the species of ungulates, the population of takin was the largest, then followed by serow and wild boar; because of heavy poaching on musk deer, they have probably been on the verge of extinction in the reserve. Serow and black muntjac were isolated, and wild boar usually lived with 2-5 group, while, the size of group of takin were 1-17 in autumn, winter and spring, which was further less than that of takin distributing in Shaanxi and Sichuan. In this survey, male-group and "leader" of takin were observed, which had been less found in other study.2. The survey in transect belts found the surveyed ungulates distributed from 1600 to 3700m in elevation, but each of them had relative concentrated zone of altitudinal distribution. Takin and serow gethered on 2500~3400m, and wild boar on 2200-3100, and black muntjac on 1900-2800, and (red) goral on1600-2500, while (red) goral covered more altitudinal zones than others species. The results revealed that takin and serow most used Fargesia-conife...
Keywords/Search Tags:Cibagou National Nature Reserve, ungulate, status, grouping behavior, habitat selection, ecological niche, hunting, conservation
PDF Full Text Request
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