Snow Leopard Conservancy India Trust, Leh, Ladakh, India.
Panthera, New York, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2019 Jan 29;14(1):e0211509. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0211509. eCollection 2019.
The snow leopard Panthera uncia is an elusive species inhabiting some of the most remote and inaccessible tracts of Central and South Asia. It is difficult to determine its distribution and density pattern, which are crucial for developing conservation strategies. Several techniques for species detection combining camera traps with remote sensing and geographic information systems have been developed to model the habitat of such cryptic and low-density species in challenging terrains. Utilising presence-only data from camera traps and direct observations, alongside six environmental variables (elevation, aspect, ruggedness, distance to water, land cover, and prey habitat suitability), we assessed snow leopard habitat suitability across Ladakh in northern India. This is the first study to model snow leopard distribution both in India and utilising direct observation data. Results suggested that elevation and ruggedness are the two most influential environmental variables for snow leopard habitat suitability, with highly suitable habitat having an elevation range of 2,800 m to 4,600 m and ruggedness of 450 m to 1,800 m. Our habitat suitability map estimated approximately 12% of Ladakh's geographical area (c. 90,000 km2) as highly suitable and 18% as medium suitability. We found that 62.5% of recorded livestock depredation along with over half of all livestock corrals (54%) and homestays (58%) occurred within highly suitable snow leopard habitat. Our habitat suitability model can be used to assist in allocation of conservation resources by targeting construction of livestock corrals to areas of high habitat suitability and promoting ecotourism programs in villages in highly suitable snow leopard habitat.
雪豹 Panthera uncia 是一种难以捉摸的物种，栖息在中亚和南亚一些最偏远和难以到达的地区。确定其分布和密度模式非常困难，这对于制定保护策略至关重要。已经开发了几种结合相机陷阱与遥感和地理信息系统的物种检测技术，以在具有挑战性的地形中对这种隐秘和低密度的物种的栖息地进行建模。利用来自相机陷阱和直接观测的仅存在数据，以及六个环境变量（海拔、方位、崎岖度、到水的距离、土地覆盖和猎物栖息地适宜性），我们评估了印度北部拉达克的雪豹栖息地适宜性。这是首次在印度境内利用直接观测数据来模拟雪豹分布的研究。结果表明，海拔和崎岖度是对雪豹栖息地适宜性影响最大的两个环境变量，高度适宜的栖息地海拔范围为 2800 米至 4600 米，崎岖度为 450 米至 1800 米。我们的栖息地适宜性地图估计拉达克约 12%的地理区域（约 90000 平方公里）为高度适宜，18%为中度适宜。我们发现，62.5%的记录牲畜掠夺事件以及一半以上的牲畜围栏（54%）和民宿（58%）发生在高度适宜的雪豹栖息地内。我们的栖息地适宜性模型可用于通过将牲畜围栏建设到高栖息地适宜性地区，并在高度适宜的雪豹栖息地内的村庄推广生态旅游计划，来协助分配保护资源。
