Human-Carnivore Conflicts: understanding predation ecology and livestock damage by snow leopards

Abstract

Livestock depredation by large carnivores and their retaliatory or preventive killing is a newlineworldwide conservation concern and an important socio-economic concern for local newlinecommunities living within carnivore ranges. This thesis is an attempt to develop an newlineunderstanding of livestock depredation along the two important dimensions of humanwildlife newlineconflict the reality of damage caused by wildlife to humans, and the newlineperceptions and attitudes of humans suffering the damage. Effective management of this issue requires an integrated understanding of both these dimensions. The work presented in the thesis focuses on the endangered snow leopard Panthera uncia as the model taxon newlineand the local communities inhabiting snow leopard habitats. I have also included the newlinesympatric wolf Canis lupus, and borrowed tools from the disciplines of ecology, newlinesociology, and molecular biology to answer the key questions. Why are certain villages or areas in a landscape more vulnerable to carnivore newlinedepredation of livestock than others? Based on data from 25 villages in the Trans- newlineHimalayan Spiti Valley, we found notable differences in livestock selectivity and newlineecological correlates of livestock depredation both perceived and actual by snow newlineleopards and wolves. Stocking density of large-bodied free-ranging livestock (yaks and newlinehorses) best explained people s threat perception of livestock depredation by snow newlineleopards, while actual livestock depredation was explained by the relative abundance of newlinesnow leopards and wild prey. In the case of wolves, peoples perception was best newlineexplained by abundance of wolves, while actual depredation by wolves was explained by newlinehabitat structure. Our results indicated a positive association between wild-prey abundance and newlinelivestock depredation by snow leopards. This was counter-intuitive, as facilitating an newlineincrease in wild-prey populations is often recommended as a measure to reduce livestock newlinedepredation by carnivores.