JAKARTA — In wildlife conservation management, the best species to focus on to maximize protection of a region’s biodiversity aren’t necessarily the most charismatic ones, a new study from Indonesia’s Leuser Ecosystem suggests. Conservation managers have long prioritized the management of what are known as umbrella species, on the basis that protecting these high-profile species also protects the ecosystem in which they live. These species tend to be ones that roam wide and large areas, which for conservation management purposes makes them representative of other, lesser-known, species. As a result, these umbrella species usually get special attention from conservation managers, funders and authorities. However, researchers from Indonesia and the U.K. have found that focusing on the usual charismatic species, like tigers and rhinos, leads to neglect of the needs of other wildlife. In a new paper published in Biological Conservation, they note that these non-flagship species might actually be better representatives of the broader biodiversity of a particular ecosystem than those considered the umbrella species. “Our study proposes a new framework to identify the best umbrella species using camera trap data collected from the field and accounting for imperfect detection i.e. that species might be undetected during surveys but they are present,” study lead author Ardiantiono, a Ph.D. student at the School of Anthropology and Conservation at the University of Kent, U.K., told Mongabay in an email interview. The Leuser Ecosystem in northern Sumatra is the largest remaining intact swath of tropical rainforest in Sumatra. Image courtesy of Global Forest…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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