Integrating camera traps and community knowledge to assess the status of the Indian pangolin Manis crassicaudata in the Eastern Ghats, India


VIKRAM ADITY A,KRISHNA PAVA N KOMAN DURI ROHIT S UB HE D A R and THYA G ARAJAN GAN ES H


Abstract Pangolins are the most trafficked animals globally. Although the Indian pangolin Manis crassicaudata occurs across the Indian subcontinent (excluding parts of the Himalayas and the north-east, where the Chinese pan- golin Manis pentadactyla is present), it is categorized as Endangered on the IUCN Red List as a result of heavy poaching for its meat and scales. Several areas have not yet been surveyed for the occurrence of the Indian pangolin, one of which is the 16,948 km2 tropical deciduous forests of the northern Eastern Ghats landscape in Andhra Pradesh. During December 2017–April 2018, we surveyed 750 km2 of this landscape for the presence of the Indian pangolin, using camera traps. As an alternative method to document pangolin presence, and to identify factors driving hunting of the species,we also conducted, during the same period, a total of 60 semi-structured interviews with people in 30 villages. Interviewees reported the presence of pangolins in a major- ity of the grid cells that we surveyed with camera traps, par- ticularly in moist deciduous forests distant from villages. However, the camera traps did not detect pangolins in 840 trap-days. Hunting of pangolins for theirmeat, which is con- sumed locally, and for their scales, which are traded, is most likely the reason for the rarity of the species in this landscape. A better understanding of the proximate and ultimate drivers of pangolin hunting is required, to inform proactive con- servation management for this increasingly threatened species.


Keywords Andhra Pradesh, community observations, East- ern Ghats, hunting, India, Indian pangolin, Manis cras- sicaudata, wildlife trade


Supplementary material for this article is available at https://doi.org/10.1017/S0030605319001303


Introduction


loss and as a threat to mammals worldwide, particularly in tropical countries (Kumara&Singh, 2004;Velho et al., 2012; Benítez-López et al., 2017). Hunting and illegal wildlife trade have severely affected all eight species of pangolins, particu- larly the four Asian species. Pangolins are believed to be the most trafficked animals globally (Wu et al., 2004; Baillie et al., 2014; Zhou et al., 2014; Challender, 2015; Challender et al., 2015). The seizure of illegally trafficked pangolins and their body parts continues unabated, with .1 million pangolins trafficked globally during 2000–2013 (Challender et al., 2014). The Indian pangolin Manis crassicaudata, categorized as Endangered on the IUCN Red List (Baillie et al., 2014), is one of two pangolin species occurring in India (the other is the Critically Endangered Chinese pangolin Manis penta- dactyla). The Indian pangolin is included under Schedule 1 Part 1 of the Indian Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972, which legally protects the species and prohibits its hunting in India, and is on Appendix I of CITES, which prohibits all commercial international trade (CITES, 2017) and places it under a zero export quota (Challender et al., 2015;Hua et al., 2015; Mohapatra et al., 2015). Pangolins feed almost exclu- sively on ants and termites, thus playing an important role in the tropical forest ecosystem (Mohapatra& Panda, 2014). Although previously widely distributed across the Indi-


H


VIKRAMADITYA (Corresponding author, orcid.org/0000-0003-3888-4369) and THYAGARAJAN GANESH (


orcid.org/0000-0002-1327-0347) Ashoka Trust for


Research in Ecology and the Environment, Royal Enclave, Sriramapura, Jakkur post, Bangalore 560064, India. E-mail vikram.aditya@atree.org


KRISHNA PAVAN KOMANDURI ( orcid.org/0000-0002-1849-9474) Bharati Vidyapeeth Deemed University, Institute of Environment Education and Research, Pune, India


ROHIT SUBHEDAR*( orcid.org/0000-0002-5594-7600) Wildlife Conservation Society–India, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India


*Also at: Bharati Vidyapeeth Deemed University, Institute of Environment Education and Research, Pune, India


Received 10 January 2019. Revision requested 5 March 2019. Accepted 28 October 2019. First published online 13 October 2020.


an subcontinent, the Indian pangolin population has sig- nificantly declined throughout its range, largely as a result of widespread hunting and trade driven by the demand for the species’ skin, scales and meat, both locally and elsewhere, and particularly in East Asia (Wu & Ma, 2007; Mahmood et al., 2012; Mishra & Panda, 2012; Challender, 2015; Challender et al., 2015;Nijmanetal., 2016). Destruction of its habitat across India has also contribut- ed to the species’ decline (Mishra & Panda, 2012; Trageser et al., 2017). The CITES wildlife trade database shows that pangolin parts are also traded for traditional medicine and for making leather products (Mohapatra et al., 2015; UNEP– WCMC, 2020). Nevertheless, there have been few studies of


This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the same Creative Commons licence is included and the original work is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use. Oryx, 2021, 55(5), 677–683 © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Fauna & Flora International doi:10.1017/S0030605319001303


unting and the associated trade in wildlife have been widely acknowledged as amajor driver of biodiversity


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