Vultures in Cambodia: population, threats and conservation

Abstract

SummaryAsian vultures have undergone dramatic declines of 90-99% in the Indian Subcontinent, as a consequence of poisoning by veterinary use of the drug diclofenac, and are at a high risk of extinction. Cambodia supports one of the only populations of three species (White-rumped Vulture Gyps bengalensis, Slender-billed Vulture G. tenuirostris and Red-headed Vulture Sarcogyps calvus) outside of South Asia where diclofenac use is not widespread. Conservation of the Cambodian sub-populations is therefore a global priority. This study analyses the results of a long-term research programme into Cambodian vultures that was initiated in 2004. Population sizes of each species are estimated at 50-200+ individuals, ranging across an area of approximately 300 km by 250 km, including adjacent areas in Laos and Vietnam. The principal causes of vulture mortality were poisoning (73%), probably as an accidental consequence of local hunting and fishing practices, and hunting or capture for traditional medicine (15%). This represents a significant loss from such a small population of long-lived, slow breeding, species such as vultures. Cambodian vultures are severely food limited and are primarily dependent on domestic ungulate carcasses, as wild ungulate populations have been severely depleted over the past 20 years. Local people across the vulture range still follow traditional animal husbandry practices, including releasing livestock into the open deciduous dipterocarp forest areas when they are not needed for work, providing the food source. Reducing threats through limiting the use of poisons (which are also harmful for human health) and supplementary food provisioning in the short to medium-term through 'vulture restaurants' is critical if Cambodian vultures are to be conserved.

“Living a good life”: conceptualizations of well-being in a conservation context in Cambodia

“…Since 2002, the international nongovernmental organization WCS has assisted the Ministry of Environment and Forestry Administration's conservation efforts in both protected areas (Clements et al 2010, 2013a. A core effort of WCS since 2005 has been to assist communities in developing participatory land-use plans for protected area villages so that the villages gain official status and to formalize the customary tenure rights in place in the wake of the weak implementation of the 2001 Land Law .…”

Simultaneous‐count models to estimate abundance from counts of unmarked individuals with imperfect detection

“…These counts provide a lower limit on the population estimate (Clements et al. ; Loveridge et al. ).…”

“…The binomial N‐mixture model cannot be applied easily because there are few monitoring sites, populations are dispersed unevenly in the landscape with no known covariates to account for this, and individuals move among sites between sampling occasions (Clements et al. ).…”

The case for banning diclofenac and the vanishing vultures

“…Each year in India, an estimated 65% of the local vulture population are injured as kite lines are coated in powdered-glass (http:// suite101.com/article/combating-threats-to-indian-and-afri can-vultures-a186154). Diclofenac is, however, the chief culprit responsible for drastic population collapse (Green et al 2004) within Asian vultures, undergoing dramatic declines of 90-99% in the Indian subcontinent as a consequence (Clements et al 2013). Reports of increasing populations of Long-billed Vultures in Pakistan after the banning of this drug certainly provide encouraging news (Chaudhry et al 2012).…”

“…Reports of increasing populations of Long-billed Vultures in Pakistan after the banning of this drug certainly provide encouraging news (Chaudhry et al 2012). Diclofenac appears not to be widely used for veterinary purposes in the Southeast Asian countries where surveys have been conducted, including Cambodia and Myanmar, and most recorded vulture deaths in Cambodia are attributed to accidental poisoning (Clements et al 2013). A research paper by Balmford (2013) describes the diclofenac ban as a deserving and timely response of the Indian government.…”