Camera-Trap Pictures: Mammals—And a Poacher—Exposed

Spotted in Suriname

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

This jaguar might be one of the lucky ones.

The camera traps in the big cat's home, Suriname's 4-million-acre (1.6-milion-hectare) Central Suriname Nature Reserve, photographed 28 mammal species, the most of any of the seven sites covered by the study. (Find out how the National Geographic Society is helping big cats.)

One of the study's key findings: "Protected areas matter," Conservation International's Ahumada said. "The bigger the forest [mammals] live in, the higher the number and diversity of species, body sizes, and diet types."

(Related pictures: "Jaguars, Short-Eared Dog Caught in Camera Trap.")

Published August 16, 2011

Shining a Light on Poaching

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

An alleged poacher appears to flee the flash of a camera trap in the 400,000-acre (1,600-hectare) Nam Kading National Protected Area in Laos. (See "Robot Animals Snare U.S. Poachers.")

Perhaps not coincidentally, Nam Kading's camera traps snapped only 13 mammal species—the lowest diversity found in any of the seven study sites, which were located in the Americas, Asia, and Africa.

Relatively small, the Laotian reserve seems to underscore a "key conclusion" of the new study—that small and shrinking protected areas result in less mammal diversity, the researchers say.

Published August 16, 2011

Five Little Pigs

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

White-lipped peccaries do a bit of nosing around at one of the Central Suriname Nature Reserve camera traps. Considered "near threatened"—and already locally extinct in nearby El Salvador—the roughly yard-long (meter-long) pig cousins are in "significant decline" due to habitat loss and hunting, according to IUCN.

The 2008-2010 study captured candid scenes in Brazil, Costa Rica, Indonesia, Laos, Suriname, Tanzania, and Uganda. Since 2010, ten more protected areas in eight new countries have been added to the tally.

The expansion should allow for even better statistics on the state of tropical mammals worldwide. "Without a systematic, global approach to monitoring these animals and making sure the data gets to people making decisions," Ahumada said, "we are only recording their extinctions, not actually saving them."

Published August 16, 2011

Say Cheese

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

A chimpanzee seems to smile for the camera in Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable Forest.

(Related: "How Smart Are Planet's Apes? 7 Intelligence Milestones.")

Researchers placed 60 camera traps in each of the sites studied between 2008 and 2010, with about one camera for every three-quarters of a mile (two square kilometers). In each reserve, the traps were left in place for one month, according to Conservation International.

Published August 16, 2011

Trunk to Trunk

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

The lowland tapir—such as this individual pictured in Manaus, Brazil—faces a high risk of extinction in the wild, according to IUCN. The mammal species main threats are "loss of habitat through deforestation, hunting for meat, and competition with domestic livestock."

After being carefully categorized by researchers, camera-trap pictures such as this hold the promise of stronger protections in the future. (Related pictures: "'Lost' Deer, Rare Cuckoo Caught in Camera Traps.")

"By using this single, standardized methodology in the years to come and comparing the data we receive," Ahumada said, "we will be able to see trends in mammal communities and take specific, targeted action to save them.”

Published August 16, 2011

Big Mammal, Big Problems

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

Not quite fitting in the frame, this nearly four-and-a-half-ton African elephant in Tanzania's Udzungwa Mountains National Park was the biggest of the mammals photographed during the camera-trap study.

The largest land animals on Earth, African elephants reach to between 8.2 and 13 feet (2.5 and 4 meters) tall at the shoulders. Their problems are equally outsize—threatened by poaching and habitat fragmentation, African elephants are classified as "vulnerable" by IUCN.

(Also see "African Elephant Really Two Wildly Different Species?")

Published August 16, 2011

A Seat Fit for a Kin

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

Mountain gorillas munch leaves in a camera-trap picture taken in Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable Forest.

Here the mammal species' greatest threats include poaching, firewood collection, human demand for land, human-started fires, and human diseases, according to IUCN—among the reasons mountain gorillas face "very high risk of extinction in the wild."

(Related pictures: "Who Murdered the Virunga Gorillas?")

Published August 16, 2011

Nosing Around

Photograph courtesy TEAM Network and WCS

A giant anteater snuffles about the leaf litter in Manaus, Brazil, during the camera-trap study. Insect eaters and smaller mammals are among the first to disappear when habitat falls, according to Conservation International. (See a baby anteater.)

The thousands of pictures snapped for the study are about a lot more than counting mammals, the study authors say. The study may provide a baseline for protection of animals that, in some way, protect us—for example by encouraging the growth of plants, which absorb carbon dioxide, and may therefore lessen global warming.

With that in mind, Ahumada said, "We hope that these data contribute to a better management of protected areas and conservation of mammals worldwide, and a more widespread use of standardized camera trapping studies to monitor these critically important animals."

The camera-trap mammal study has been published online by the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.

Published August 16, 2011