Recovery Potential of a Western Lowland Gorilla Population following a Major Ebola Outbreak: Results from a Ten Year Study
Recovery Potential of a Western Lowland Gorilla Population following a Major Ebola Outbreak: Results from a Ten Year Study
复制标题
DOI：
10.1371/journal.pone.0037106
复制
发表时间：
2012-05-23
期刊：
影响因子：
3.7
通讯作者：
Menard, Nelly
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Genton, Celine;Cristescu, Romane;Menard, Nelly
调查野生动物种群在人口崩溃后的恢复能力引起了生态学家和自然资源保护主义者的极大兴趣。由于在人口崩溃之前和之后监测人口都很困难，因此研究这些方面的机会很少。中部非洲爆发的埃博拉疫情导致受影响的西部低地大猩猩（Gorilla gorilla gorilla）种群中高达 95% 的个体死亡。评估受影响的种群是否恢复以及恢复的速度对于保护这种极度濒危的分类群至关重要。在 2004 年埃博拉病毒影响前、两年后和六年后，我们对刚果共和国奥扎拉-科库阿国家公园 Lokoue 森林空地的大猩猩种群进行了监测。这使我们能够描述埃博拉病毒对种群结构的短期和长期影响。埃博拉疫情爆发前，大猩猩数量约为 380 只，疫情爆发后，大猩猩数量降至不足 40 只。疫情爆发后六年保持稳定。然而，这一小部分人口的人口结构已经发生了显着变化。尽管一些孤独的雄性已经消失，但成年雌性的移民、新繁殖群体的形成以及一些出生事件表明，种群数量正在显示出恢复的潜力。在疫情爆发期间，幸存的成年和亚成年雌性加入了老年独居银背大猩猩的行列。随后人们观察到这些雌性银背龟加入了幼年银背龟的行列，形成了新的繁殖群体，随后在那里产下后代。有趣的是，我们观察到一些雌性银背蛇加入了不太可能生育其婴儿的银背蛇行列，但没有观察到杀婴行为。埃博拉疫情爆发后两年和六年对人口结构的影响是不同的。因此，我们的结果可以用作人口统计指标来检测和确定其他未监测大猩猩种群中发生的疫情爆发的日期。
Investigating the recovery capacity of wildlife populations following demographic crashes is of great interest to ecologists and conservationists. Opportunities to study these aspects are rare due to the difficulty of monitoring populations both before and after a demographic crash. Ebola outbreaks in central Africa have killed up to 95% of the individuals in affected western lowland gorilla (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) populations. Assessing whether and how fast affected populations recover is essential for the conservation of this critically endangered taxon. The gorilla population visiting Lokoue forest clearing, Odzala-Kokoua National Park, Republic of the Congo, has been monitored before, two years after and six years after Ebola affected it in 2004. This allowed us to describe Ebola's short-term and long-term impacts on the structure of the population. The size of the population, which included around 380 gorillas before the Ebola outbreak, dropped to less than 40 individuals after the outbreak. It then remained stable for six years after the outbreak. However, the demographic structure of this small population has significantly changed. Although several solitary males have disappeared, the immigration of adult females, the formation of new breeding groups, and several birth events suggest that the population is showing potential to recover. During the outbreak, surviving adult and subadult females joined old solitary silverbacks. Those females were subsequently observed joining young silverbacks, forming new breeding groups where they later gave birth. Interestingly, some females were observed joining silverbacks that were unlikely to have sired their infant, but no infanticide was observed. The consequences of the Ebola outbreak on the population structure were different two years and six years after the outbreak. Therefore, our results could be used as demographic indicators to detect and date outbreaks that have happened in other, non-monitored gorilla populations.