Instituto de Conservación, Biodiversidad y Territorio, Facultad de Ciencias Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile.
Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Wildlife Ecology and Coexistence Laboratory, Villarrica Campus, Centro de Investigación para el Desarrollo Local (CEDEL), Villarrica, La Araucanía, Chile.
Sci Total Environ. 2021 Apr 15;765:142713. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.142713. Epub 2020 Oct 3.
The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic brought an unusual decrease in human activity associated with partial and total lockdowns. Simultaneously, a series of wildlife sightings-mainly in urban areas-have been brought to public attention and often attributed to lockdown measures. Here we report on a series of wild carnivore records, including threatened species, obtained through camera traps set in urban forests, campuses, suburbs, and peri-urban areas of two cities in Chile, during partial lockdown measures. Our records are novel for Chile, a country where urban carnivore ecology is mostly unknown, and include the detection of four native carnivores, including the vulnerable güiña (Leopardus guigna) and the endangered southern river otter (Lontra provocax). These records also constitute a valuable baseline collected during partial lockdown measures in two cities of the Global South. We emphasize, however, that these findings cannot be used to argue for or against an effect of lockdown measures on wildlife. More generally, we call for caution in the interpretation of seemingly novel carnivore records during periods of lockdown and stress the value of international collaboration in evaluating the effects of the Anthropause on wildlife.
新冠疫情大流行的爆发导致人类活动异常减少，这与部分和全面封锁有关。与此同时，一系列野生动物目击事件——主要发生在城市地区——引起了公众的注意，并且这些事件往往归因于封锁措施。在这里，我们报告了一系列通过在智利两个城市的城市森林、校园、郊区和城市周边地区设置的相机陷阱获得的野生动物记录，包括受威胁物种，这些记录是在部分封锁措施期间获得的。对于智利来说，这些记录是新颖的，因为智利的城市食肉动物生态学大多不为人知，其中包括易危的智利山猫（Leopardus guigna）和濒危的南河獭（Lontra provocax）。这些记录也构成了在全球南方两个城市的部分封锁措施期间收集的有价值的基线。然而，我们强调，这些发现不能用于支持或反对封锁措施对野生动物的影响。更广泛地说，我们呼吁在封锁期间对看似新颖的食肉动物记录的解释持谨慎态度，并强调国际合作在评估人类活动减少对野生动物的影响方面的价值。
