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Demographic responses to changes in conservation management : a case study on elephants in the Kruger National Park
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Robson, Ashley |
| Copyright Year | 2015 |
| Abstract | Climate, food, water, shelter and density are limiting factors that shape the demographic patterns of large herbivore populations. Human intervention can however decouple population dynamics from spatiotemporal variations in some of these factors. A population should respond demographically when management ceases to intervene, and should do so in a manner predicted by theory. We assessed this prediction using the African elephants (Loxodonta africana) of the Kruger National Park as a case study. We used a 28-year time series to examine the responses of calf recruitment and population growth rates to climate, primary productivity and density during different periods of human interference. We divided our time series into two contrasting eras. Relatively low densities, extensive provisioning of water and fencing characterised the culling era. In the post-culling era, management removed some supplemented water and fences and allowed the population to fluctuate without interference. The most notable response was that as densities rose after culling, density-dependent processes took over from density-independent reproduction as the primary driver of population growth. Densitydependent weaned calf survival and dispersal likely contributed to this. We also found that the |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/50768/Robson_Demographic_2015.pdf;jsessionid=96323C7063683E0E04DD9920B3B3E705?sequence=1 |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
