Monitoring changes in species distribution and abundance is central to the sustainable management of natural resources and the definition of conservat

监测物种分布和丰富度的变化是自然资源可持续管理和保护目标定义的核心。然而，对于许多稀有，广泛和神秘的物种，在大时空尺度上的监测仍然是一个严峻的挑战。一套不断增长和日益复杂的分析工具存在，可用于估计物种的丰度，密度或占用景观。关于这些方法的技术文献强调了对可检测性的变化进行统计控制的绝对必要性。没有这一点，就无法将丰度的真实趋势与可探测性的混淆趋势分开，从而可能导致错误的结论。要准确区分丰度变化和可探测性，需要满足具体的假设，而这又需要严格设计和应用实地方法。在实践中，这通常意味着调查是由专业的生态学家设计和执行的，并且有非常可观的劳动力成本，特别是在大规模执行时。针对这种成本限制，另一种监测文献强调实用性。虽然认识到稳健的，无偏见的监测方法的可取性，这些研究指出，如果这些方法过于昂贵，不能在足够大的空间和时间尺度上应用，以提供所需的信息，这些方法是毫无意义的。这在发展中国家尤其如此，那里的资金通常有限且断断续续，而且管理优先事项往往需要大面积偏远、难以到达的地形的信息。因此，在提倡首先要准确的监测方法的人和强调长期成本效益的人之间存在着紧张关系。虽然监测方法在某些情况下既准确又负担得起，但成本和准确性之间的权衡仍然是生物多样性监测中普遍存在的未解决的问题。让当地人民参与进来是更可持续监测的一个办法。这样做的好处有两方面：降低劳动力成本，促进将监测结果转化为有效的管理行动。然而，仍然必须组织信息收集，以最大限度地提高准确性。虽然有一些很好的例子，当地参与生态监测，这仍然是欠发达的，许多问题仍然关于它的有效应用。这项研究将开发一种新的方法来监测广泛的动物种群在发展中国家：访谈为基础的文献分析。我们的目标是：在不同密度和空间分布水平的一系列物种中测试该方法;评估生物物理和基于生物的可探测性的变化来源;量化不同物种和观察者类型的成本、精确度和准确度之间的权衡（如护林员、牧民和非木材森林产品收集者）;为今后实施该方法提出建议，这项研究将与贝宁的一个联合国教育、科学及文化组织项目合作进行，该项目旨在加强对Warly-Pendjari保护综合体的保护，该综合体被全球公认为保护优先事项。该项目旨在支持保护区的管理和保护，提高对当地社区使用自然资源的认识，并探讨将以社区为中心的资源管理纳入土地使用规划的各种选择。具体来说，这项博士研究将帮助该项目实现有关野生动物种群监测和当地社区参与管理的关键目标。更广泛地说，这项研究将通过在有限的时间和财政资源下，在大空间范围内推进有效监测野生动物种群的方法，具有可扩展的适用性。

Monitoring changes in species distribution and abundance is central to the sustainable management of natural resourcesand the definition of conservation goals. However for many rare, widespread and cryptic species, monitoring over largespatiotemporal scales remains a serious challenge. A growing and increasingly complex set of analytical tools exists thatcan be used to estimate the abundance, density or occupancy of species across landscapes. The technical literature onthese methods emphasises the absolute necessity of controlling statistically for variation in detectability. Without this, realtrends in abundance cannot be separated from confounding trends in detectability, potentially leading to mistakenconclusions. Robustly distinguishing variations in abundance from detectability requires that specific assumptions aresatisfied, which in turn requires rigorous design and application of field methods. In practice, this usually means thatsurveys are designed and executed by professional ecologists, and have very substantial labour costs, particularly whenexecuted over large scales.In response to this cost constraint, another strand of the monitoring literature emphasises practicality. While recognising thedesirability of robust, unbiased monitoring methods, these studies point out such approaches are pointless if they are tooexpensive to be applied over sufficiently large spatial and temporal scales to provide the information needed formanagement. This is particularly true in developing countries, where funding is usually limited and intermittent, andmanagement priorities often demand information over large areas of remote, inaccessible terrain.Tension thus exists between those advocating monitoring methods that are, above all, accurate, and those who rather emphasise long-term cost effectiveness. While monitoring methods can be both accurate and affordable in somecircumstances, the tradeoff between cost and accuracy is nonetheless a pervasive and unresolved problem in biodiversitymonitoring. One approach to more sustainable monitoring has been involving local people. The benefits of this can be twofold:reducing labour costs, and facilitating the translation of monitoring results into effective management action. However,it remains important to structure information gathering to maximise accuracy. While there are some good examples of theintegration of local participation into ecological monitoring, it remains underdeveloped, and many questions remain aboutits effective application.This study will develop a new method for monitoring widespread animal populations in developing countries; interviewbasedoccupancy analysis. We aim to: test the approach with a range of species at different levels of density and spatialdistribution; assess the sources of variation in detectability, both biophysical and observer-based; quantify trade-offsbetween cost, precision and accuracy for different species and observer types (e.g. rangers vs pastoralist vs NTFPcollectors); make recommendations for future implementation of the approach.The study will be carried out in partnership with a ZSL project in Benin, which aims to strengthen conservation of the WArly-Pendjari conservation complex, globally recognised as a conservation priority. That project aims to support ProtectedArea management and protection, improve understanding of local community use of natural resources and explore optionsfor integrating community centred resource management into land use planning. Specifically this PhD research will helpthe project meet key objectives regarding wildlife population monitoring and engaging local communities in management.More broadly this research will have widescale applicability by advancing methodologies appropriate for efficient monitoringof wildlife populations at a large spatial scale under limited time and financial resources.