Introduction
Predators may not seem more important than adding
diversity to planet Earth, but they provide balance within our world’s
ecosystems. Many predators are part of
trophic cascades and they may be considered keystone species. In trophic cascades, if top predators are
removed, then control of grazer abundance is released and they over-graze the
plants which help recycle CO2 and provide oxygen to the earth. If a cascade occurs from removing one
predator, then that animal may be a keystone species because it has a disproportionately large effect on its environment relative to its abundance (Strong 2013). Today, these important species are in peril,
remaining in only small populations and still in danger of extinction. However, to protect and preserve natural populations without
direct contact can prove challenging. Moreover, many of these large animals are forced
to live in closer proximity to humans’ urban cities because we are occupying
their habitat. In this blog, I will
discuss human interactions with these animals .
The lion’s share of this blog will focus on individual predator’s current
abundance, human interactions if any, and today’s conservation efforts. First I will discuss some ideas on how to understand human-carnivore encounters and the potential to avoid them through creating a global database. Next, I will bring up an encounter in Mumbai, India and research based off the attack. I will follow up on Cougars in Urban environments and the research that is being done on how to prevent many of their mortalities. In addition I'll mention where research is lacking to connect cougar success to other large predators. I will then talk about bears and current conservation efforts and lastly end with conservation efforts in action for the South American Jaguar.
My first comment is a general one; you need to use more commas! Especially when you have really long introductory phrases. For example:
ReplyDelete"However, fighting for their conservation in order to preserve natural populations without direct contact can prove challenging. " needs commas to more clear"
Your introductory phrase ends at contact and you need to use a comma after a phrase that is over 4 words long. Also when you get to phrases that are this long, it is usually better to rephrase the sentence because it often turns into passive voice. There are a lot of sentences like this and they tend to be confusing and not to the point. As a result they often lose their meaning.
Second you have a typo that should probably be corrected; it says "ass" instead of "as". The sentence is:
"This still poses a threat especially when 4 of 9 tracked cougars encounter fatal traffic accidents in one study (Beier 1995) ass seen in table 1."
Also in the intro you talk about how predators may be part of a trophic cascade OR a keystone species. This is not exactly correct because all species are part of a trophic cascade. Trophic cascades refer in part to the food web but the correct way to talk about the results of changes to the trophic cascade is to say they are "cascading effects" that percolate through the system.
I through the section about the leopards was very interesting. You mention how the culture does not lead to killing them. But then I wonder how successful are the populations that seems to be coexisting? The study talked about the presence of species but not really how the people and leopards are getting along. I assume there are some conflicts but I wondered how exactly it is working.
For the cougar section. You should be careful and either call them mountain lions or cougars but don't use both. I think these names depend on the region you're in but it would be better, in your paper, if you stuck to using just one. Also I think you need to define corridors. The way I understood it was that wildlife corridors are ones where natural habitats are interspersed with urban areas in attempts to provide habitat connectivity. I think you should talk about how these areas are especially important for species like mountain lions who need large ranges to get enough prey. It could use a little more clarification.
For the bear section: I was wondering if there was any discussion about how humans are affecting bear fecundity rates? I know you mentioned fecundity once but I was wondering if human interactions some how elevate stress levels in bears, causing decreased fecundity?
This was a really interesting topic! I actually wrote a paper on this subject last quarter and I think you did a good job incorporating all the different aspects of wildlife-human interactions, such as food increasing and habitat patchiness. :)
I like your introduction a lot. It was very well written by first you introducing the concepts of how a predator is a keystone species and connecting that to population dynamics by stating that in top predators are removed, then control of grazer abundance is released and they over-graze the plants. Also, I like how at the end of your introduction you list all of the topics you are going to cover. I like the Table 1 graph a lot because it gives the different kind of large carnivore that come into conflict with humans. I never knew that there were so many!
ReplyDeleteOne of the statements I read in your paper that really surprised me was that I can’t believe over 90% of the recorded large carnivore attacks on human occurredin Asia and Africa between 1950 and 2000. This statement surprised me because all of theses attacks were reported. Usually in countries of Asia or Africa you would not consider them to be reported because they’re not developed countries. I am surprised so many attacks happened there? Do you know why that is? Another interesting statement was that over 12 thousand people were killed in a century from tigers alone. That is a lot!! I like in how detailed you explained the study done with leopards in India. From the study I got that people in India are trying to learn to deal with large carnivores cats and do not hurt them.
I also like your section on Jaguars explaining the capture of the guinea pig. It’s funny the other day I was watching a video on youtube of a Jaguar capturing a guinea pig. In the youtube video it showed the Jaguar bent down and stalking through some high grasses. Another thing the Jaguar did when it got really close to the guinea pig was that in the grass it put its paws in a position where the fur was touching the grass because the fur does not make any contact with the grass. So it basically just put it paws backward on the grass so the fur was in contact with the grass to minimize the noise. Overall a great blog and I truly enjoyed reading it. Great work!
Cons: For one of the interests you could have gone into more detail of why so many of the attacks happen in Asia and Africa countries. You could have mentioned that it happens in those two areas because there is a lot of biodiversity near the tropics and more biodiversity, which leads to a higher population of large carnivores.