Saturday, October 23, 2010

Factors influencing densities of striped hyenas (Hyaena hyaena) in arid regions of India


I read an excellent paper by PRIYA SINGH, ARJUN M. GOPALASWAMY, and K. ULLAS KARANTH titled  " Factors influencing densities of striped hyenas (Hyaena hyaena) in arid regions of India", published in the Journal of Mammalogy.

The paper drives home the point that striped hyenas, despite the ability to adapt to human-modified landscapes, require natural habitats free of anthropogenic disturbances to serve as refugia for source populations. The authors advocate creation of more protected refugia for hyenas across arid regions if India. One finding of interest is that this large carnivore appears to survive at high densities even in human-dominated landscapes. The authors contend that persistence of hyenas in this arid region appears to be a function of availability of disturbance-free denning refugia in hilly terrain and abundant availability of livestock carcasses. 

Journal of Mammalogy, 91(5):1152–1159, 2010

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