The impact of tree modification by African elephant (Loxodonta africana) on herpetofaunal species richness in northern Tanzania

Nasseri, Nabil A.; McBrayer, Lance D.; Schulte, Bruce A.

doi:10.1111/j.1365-2028.2010.01238.x

Cited by 43 publications

(36 citation statements)

References 28 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…This concentration of elephants has an obviously negative effect on vegetation structure and composition as elephants debark, browse intensively and destroy trees. Many studies have reported that elephants can precipitate declines in tree populations or marked changes in community composition (Guldemond & Van Aarde, 2007;Landman et al, 2008;Nasseri et al, 2011;Swanepoel & Swanepoel, 1986). Satellite images used in this study had been recorded in the dry season.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatio-Temporal Dynamics in Land Use and Habitat Fragmentation within a Protected Area Dedicated to Tourism in a Sudanian Savanna of West Africa

Dimobe

Goetze

Ouédraogo

et al. 2017

Journal of Landscape Ecology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Nazinga Game Ranch (NGR) is a reserve in Burkina Faso involving local communities for securing biodiversity through sustainable management. Yet, its ecosystems are threatened by increasing number of elephants and illegal human activities. Renowned as a model of wildlife participatory management, NGR has mainly been studied for its animal wildlife only. The aim of this study was to uncover ecological effects of recent land management on savanna habitats including tourism, and to conclude on more sustainable options, land use/land cover (LULC) changes and vegetation dynamics in NGR were analyzed. This was accomplished with multi-temporal change detection using Landsat images of 1984, 2002 and 2013 to map seven representative LULC classification categories, and quantitative indices of landscape metrics. The results showed that the LULC dynamics in NGR from 1984 to 2013 was mainly characterized by an expansion of gallery forest, tree savanna and agricultural area and a reduction of shrub savanna, woodland and bare soils. From 2002 to 2013, fragmentation in all land cover types increased at the landscape level, whereas at the class level, it decreased for woodland. Our findings provided evidence of habitat degradation in NGR, due to extensive agriculture, tourism and growing of elephants' population. According to the original management goals and the purposes of the reserve, both fauna and tourism are to be maintained and sustained in a sustainable way. Adaptation of land use and targeted wildlife management are the main requirements for avoiding further degradation of vegetation and thus of the existence basis of local inhabitants, animals and tourism.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatio-Temporal Dynamics in Land Use and Habitat Fragmentation within a Protected Area Dedicated to Tourism in a Sudanian Savanna of West Africa

Dimobe

Goetze

Ouédraogo

et al. 2017

Journal of Landscape Ecology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Positive HIII, on the other hand, arise from diverse facilitative mechanisms. First, LMH may physically engineer habitat for specialist consumers; for example, frogs live in Amazonian peccary wallows (Beck, Thebpanya & Filiaggi ) and Sri Lankan elephant dung (Campos‐Arceiz ), while geckos and other reptiles find shelter among elephant‐damaged trees in African savannas (Pringle ; Nasseri, McBrayer & Schulte ; Pringle et al . ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…(a) Pathways of negative (left) and positive (right) HIII that have been documented in African savannas: (i) large herbivores consume vegetation, competitively suppressing small mammals and negatively impacting snakes that prey on rodents (McCauley et al . ); (ii) elephants are ecosystem engineers that increase microhabitat availability and quality for reptiles and amphibians by damaging trees (Nasseri, McBrayer & Schulte ; Pringle ); (iii) apex predators (e.g. leopards) may constrain the densities and/or behaviour of smaller bodied large herbivore species (Sinclair, Mduma & Brashares ; Ford et al .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does primary productivity modulate the indirect effects of large herbivores? A global meta‐analysis

Daskin

Pringle

2016

Journal of Animal Ecology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Summary1. Indirect effects of large mammalian herbivores (LMH), while much less studied than those of apex predators, are increasingly recognized to exert powerful influences on communities and ecosystems. The strength of these effects is spatiotemporally variable, and several sets of authors have suggested that they are governed in part by primary productivity. However, prior theoretical and field studies have generated conflicting results and predictions, underscoring the need for a synthetic global analysis. 2. We conducted a meta-analysis of the direction and magnitude of large mammalian herbivore-initiated indirect interactions using 67 published studies comprising 456 individual responses. We georeferenced 41 of these studies (comprising 253 responses from 33 locations on five continents) to a satellite-derived map of primary productivity. Because predator assemblages might also influence the impact of large herbivores, we conducted a similar analysis using a global map of large carnivore species richness. 3. In general, LMH reduced the abundance of other consumer species and also tended to reduce consumer richness, although the latter effect was only marginally significant. 4. There was a pronounced reduction in the strength of negative (i.e. suppressive, due e.g., to competition) indirect effects of LMH on consumer abundance in more productive ecosystems. In contrast, positive (facilitative) indirect effects were not significantly correlated with productivity, likely because these comprised a more heterogeneous array of mechanisms. We found no effect of carnivore species richness on herbivore-initiated indirect effect strength. 5. Our findings help to resolve the fundamental problem of ecological contingency as it pertains to the strength of an understudied class of multitrophic interactions. Moreover, these results will aid in predicting the indirect effects of anthropogenic wildlife declines and irruptions, and how these effects might be mediated by climatically driven shifts in resource availability. To the extent that intact ungulate guilds help to suppress populations of small animals that act as agricultural pests and disease reservoirs, the negative impacts of large mammal declines on human well-being may be relatively stronger in low-productivity areas.

show abstract

“…Un d eclin continu de la v eg etation, aggrav e par les el ephants, pourrait compromettre les efforts de conservation locaux. Schoeman, 2008;Nasseri, McBrayer & Schulte, 2010;Leonard, 2013;O'Connor & Page, 2014) have shown that elephants play an important role in the structure and composition of African savannahs. This is in large part due to their impact on trees.…”

Section: R Esum Ementioning

confidence: 99%

Feeding patterns of elephants at the Atherstone Collaborative Nature Reserve

et al. 2018

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The African savannah elephant (Loxodonta africana Blumenbach) is a generalist herbivore that relies on widely distributed resources. Vegetation decline, aggravated by these elephants, can compromise local conservation efforts. Thus it imperative to understand the factors that drive them to consume specific plant species and plant parts. The objective of our study was to investigate the feeding patterns of African savannah elephants in the enclosed bushveld savannah at the Atherstone Collaborative Nature Reserve in South Africa. For 1 year, we examined elephant selection of woody versus herbaceous vegetation, and identified which plant species and parts were preferentially consumed. We accomplished this by directly observing feeding elephants, and by utilizing data collected on elephant footprints, dung piles, stripped bark and broken branches. We further conducted vegetation surveys to determine selection frequency relative to species abundance. Elephants showed a preference for different plant parts consumption in the feeding plots. In total, leaves, branches and bark contributed mostly to their diet. Seasonal selection patterns showed an increasing proportion of bark and branch consumption during the dry season.

show abstract

The impact of tree modification by African elephant (Loxodonta africana) on herpetofaunal species richness in northern Tanzania

Cited by 43 publications

References 28 publications

Spatio-Temporal Dynamics in Land Use and Habitat Fragmentation within a Protected Area Dedicated to Tourism in a Sudanian Savanna of West Africa

Spatio-Temporal Dynamics in Land Use and Habitat Fragmentation within a Protected Area Dedicated to Tourism in a Sudanian Savanna of West Africa

Does primary productivity modulate the indirect effects of large herbivores? A global meta‐analysis

Feeding patterns of elephants at the Atherstone Collaborative Nature Reserve

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About