Binturong ecology and conservation in pristine, fragmented and degraded tropical forests
ARAT A HONDA,ZAC H A R Y AMIR,CAL EBE P. MENDE S JONA T H A N H. MOORE and MATTHEW S COT T L USKIN
Abstract The persistence of seed-dispersing animals in degraded habitats could be critical for ensuring the long- term conservation value and restoration of forests. This is particularly important in Southeast Asia, where .70%of the remaining forest areas are within 1 km of a forest edge, and many are degraded (e.g. logged).We synthesized infor- mation on the habitat associations of the binturong Arctictis binturong, a large, semi-arboreal, frugivorous civet and one of the most important seed dispersers in the region, especially for figs (Ficus spp).We adopted amultiscale approach by em- ploying ensemble species distribution modelling from pres- ence-only records, assessing landscape-scale variation in detection rates in published camera-trap studies and using hierarchical occupancy modelling to assess local (i.e. with- in-landscape) patterns observed from 20 new camera-trap surveys. Contrary to prior reports that binturongs are strong- ly associated with intact forests, the species was equally pre- sent in degraded forests and near forest edgeswhere sufficient forest cover was maintained (.40% forest cover within a 20-kmradius).The species also toleratesmoderate incursions of oil palm plantations (,20% of the area within a 20-km radius covered by oil palm plantations).The relative resilience of binturongs to habitat degradation could be in part because of behavioural adaptations towards increased nocturnal activity. These results support the notion that key seed dis- persers can persist and maintain their ecological function in degraded forests.
Keywords Arctictis binturong, camera trap, civet, conser- vation, habitat associations, occupancy modelling, seed dispersal, Southeast Asia, Viverridae
ARATAHONDA*(
orcid.org/0000-0002-7881-4413) Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale University, New Haven, USA
ZACHARY AMIR ( LUSKIN† (Corresponding author, CALEBE P. MENDES (
orcid.org/0000-0002-8398-2059) and MATTHEW SCOTT
orcid.org/0000-0002-5236-7096,
m.luskin
@
uq.edu.au), School of Biological Sciences, University of Queensland, 534 Goddard Hall, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia
orcid.org/0000-0003-1323-3287), Asian School of the Environment, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
JONATHAN H. MOORE‡ School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen, China
*Also at: School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Queensland, St Lucia, Australia †Also at: Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science, University of Queensland, St Lucia, Australia ‡Also at: School ofEnvironmental Sciences,UniversityofEastAnglia, Norwich,UK
Received 22 March 2022. Revision requested 12 July 2022. Accepted 15 December 2022. First published online 4 July 2023.
The supplementary material for this article is available at
doi.org/10.1017/S0030605322001491
Introduction
threats being forest loss and hunting (Duckworth et al., 2012). More than 70% of remaining forest areas are within 1 km of a forest edge or are otherwise degraded (Haddad et al., 2015). Populations of large animals tend to decline at habitat edges and in degraded habitats but there are few species-specific assessments in Asia, especially for cryptic animals (Chutipong et al., 2014; Benítez-López et al., 2017; Haysom et al., 2021; Hughes et al., 2021; Amir et al., 2022). Here we examine the effects of forest degradation on binturongs Arctictis binturong, large frugivorous civets (Viverridae) that play a key ecological role in supporting the resilience of degraded forests through seed dispersal (Lambert, 1990; Shanahan et al., 2001;Colon &Campos- Arceiz, 2013; Nakabayashi et al., 2017; Nakabayashi & Ahmad, 2018; Allam et al., 2019; Nakabayashi et al., 2019; Ong et al., 2022). Binturongs are the world’s largest civets (adults can weigh
S
.20 kg) and range from north-east India through the mainlands and islands of Southeast Asia (Wilcox et al., 2016). They are semi-arboreal and mostly frugivorous, spending much of their time resting and feeding in the can- opy of fig trees. They also consume smaller amounts of other fruits, leaves, birds, carrion and fish (Lambert, 1990;Lambert et al., 2014; Semiadi et al., 2016; Nakabayashi et al., 2017; Nakabayashi & Ahmad, 2018; Debruille et al., 2020; Naka- bayashi, 2020). Binturongs disperse a wide diversity of figs, including effective digestion and defecation of hemiepiphytes (strangler figs). They have rapid digestion rates, promoting seed germination, which in turn supports many other animals (Lambert, 1990; Shanahan et al., 2001; Colon & Campos-Arceiz, 2013; Nakabayashi et al., 2017; Nakabayashi & Ahmad, 2018; Nakabayashi et al., 2019; Nakabayashi, 2020). The importance of frugivorous species in the order Carnivora has often been overlooked (Draper et al., 2022), and binturong seed dispersal could be especially important in the Indo-Malayan region where there have been severe declines of larger herbivores including Sumatran rhinocer- oses Dicerorhinus sumatrensis, primates, sun bears Helarctos
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work. Oryx, 2024, 58(2), 218–227 © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Fauna & Flora International doi:10.1017/S0030605322001491
outheast Asia has the highest number of threatened mammals of all terrestrial bioregions, with the primary
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