Determinants of human-elephant conflict in a land-use mosaic
Determinants of human-elephant conflict in a land-use mosaic
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DOI：
10.1046/j.1365-2664.1999.00437.x
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发表时间：
1999-10-01
影响因子：
5.7
通讯作者：
Hoare, RE
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Hoare, RE
1. 近年来，解决非洲人与大象之间的直接冲突已经成为当地一个严重的政治问题，也是一个大陆保护问题。“问题大象”破坏庄稼、食物储备和水源，有时还威胁到人类的生命。80%的非洲象的活动范围不在正式的保护区之内，对人象冲突的管理不当往往是大象数量和分布进一步下降的前兆。随着农业与大象活动范围的扩大，非洲各种生态系统中的冲突似乎越来越多。目前的研究记录了在15000公里大象范围内小范围内问题大象的事件。3年来问题象的活动水平变化很大，不能用象密度、保护区附近、人类住区面积、人类密度或当地降雨量来解释。研究区人象冲突事件的不规则性和不可预测性主要取决于个体象的行为生态。这项研究提出了一个统计数据来量化非洲的问题大象活动，可以用来比较不同生态系统在不同时间的问题事件的强度：“每年每平方公里人类住区的大象事件”。对人象界面的适当数据进行空间分析可能会对冲突过程产生更具预测性的理解。
1. The resolution of direct conflict between humans and elephants in Africa has become a serious local political issue in recent years, and a continental conservation problem. 'Problem elephants' damage crops, food stores and water sources, and sometimes threaten human life.2. Eighty per cent of the African elephant's range lies outside formally protected areas, and inadequate management of human-elephant conflict is frequently a precursor to further decline in the numbers and distribution of elephants. Conflict appears to be increasing in an assortment of African ecosystems as the agricultural interface with elephant range expands.3. The present study recorded incidents by problem elephants in small subdivisions df a 15 000 km(2) elephant range. The level of problem elephant activity over 3 years showed huge variation and could not be explained by elephant density, proximity of a protected area, area of human settlement, human density or local rainfall.4. It is proposed that the irregular and unpredictable nature of human-elephant conflict incidents in the study area mainly depended upon the behavioural ecology of individual elephant bulls.5. This study proposes a statistic to quantify problem elephant activity in Africa which can be used to compare the intensity of problem incidents between different ecosystems at different times: 'elephant incidents per square kilometre of human settlement area per year'. Spatial analyses of appropriate data at the human-elephant interface may yield a more predictive understanding of the conflict process.