Suitable habitat prediction of Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus roxellana) and its implications for conservation in Baihe Nature Reserve, Sichuan, China.

Suitable habitat prediction of Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus roxellana) and its implications for conservation in Baihe Nature Reserve, Sichuan, China. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2019 Oct 11;: Authors: Dong X, Chu YM, Gu X, Huang Q, Zhang J, Bai W Abstract As an endemic primate species with one of the highest priorities in wildlife conservation in China, Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus roxellana) have undergone a sharp decline and range reduction in recent centuries. Here, we used maximum entropy modelling (MaxEnt) integrated with four types of environmental variables, including three biological climate variables (Bio17, precipitation of the driest quarter; Bio6, min. temperature of the coldest month; and Bio2, mean diurnal range), three topographic variables (altitude, slope, and aspect), two anthropogenic variables (Human Footprint Index and human disturbance), and three vegetation-related variables (enhanced vegetation index, normalized difference vegetation index, and Wet Index) to identify the spatial distribution of suitable habitats for Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys in Baihe Nature Reserve (BNR), which is located in the Minshan Mountains. The average training AUC of our model performance is 0.929 ± 0.003. The model predicted 9.6 km2 of high suitability habitats and 14.1 km2 of moderate suitability habitats for Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys, adding up to only 11.7% of the total area of concern for the stu...
Source: Environmental Science and Pollution Research International - Category: Environmental Health Authors: Tags: Environ Sci Pollut Res Int Source Type: research