Tracking a better way to count wildlife: testing the Formozov-Malyshev-Pereleshin (FMP) formula in the Kalahari

• Author / Creator

  Keeping, Derek

• The science of conservation biology is about conserving species. To do so often requires information about population sizes. Great efforts have been devoted to counting animals, the diverse means by which are invariably taxa and environment-limited. Faced with a biodiversity crisis, conservationists have a pressing need for methods that are robust but also practical and cost-effective. Comprehensiveness, that is the ability to capture many species simultaneously, is also advantageous. Animals, defined by their mobility, are often hard to see, mammals in particular. They do however leave tracks which in some environments are conspicuous and ubiquitous whereas the animals themselves are not. It is self-evident that more animals leave more tracks, but there are a host of other factors difficult to diagnose and suspected to confound this simple relationship. As a result, the mainstream demotes tracks to indices of relative abundance instead of attempting inference on population sizes. Almost 90 years ago Russian biologists derived a parsimonious model explaining transect counts of animal tracks in relation to population density and movement rates. The Formozov-Malyshev-Pereleshin (FMP) formula is both contentious for its simplicity, and little-known to the English scientific literature. The goal of this thesis was to examine the FMP formula as a means of expanding the use of tracking in conservation science. The setting for my studies was the sandy semi-arid Kalahari, with optimal year-round tracking conditions, host to a diverse mammalian wildlife community, and wherein I collaborated with expert local !Xo hunters to obtain accurate track counts and animal movement data. I first subjected the FMP formula to tests using simulations with both virtual and empirical data. By way of various simulated controls and manipulations of density, day range, and travel path tortuosity, I verified that the FMP estimator is theoretically robust. In so doing, I also highlighted the counter-intuitive necessity to enumerate all track interceptions with the sample transect regardless of double-counting individual animals. Secondly, I tested whether allometrically-estimated day range could adequately substitute empirical day range, in order to make FMP application more efficient for abundance assessments of complete wildlife communities. I found that obtaining locality-specific day ranges for a subset of species improved density estimates among the larger multi-species community derived from general allometric relationships. Thirdly, I made empirical comparisons of FMP-based population estimates to those using independent methods, namely distance sampling and aerial counts. I found little evidence that such conventional methods of standard practice exceeded FMP estimates in accuracy or precision, while the track-based estimates were clearly superior in terms of species comprehensiveness, distribution mapping, and cost-effectiveness. Whereas tracks are typically downplayed in relevance as nebulous indices and increasingly supplanted by high technology solutions for wildlife observations, I conclude that my research into the FMP formula warrants a reconsideration of tracking and future allocation of limited conservation resources. This is perhaps no more relevant than in the Kalahari environment where a dearth of reliable data and absence of local community involvement in conservation monitoring and practice ultimately imperils wild landscapes, while also contributing to the decline in advanced tracking skills and thus future possibility.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Botswana
  • random encounter model
  • tracking
  • spoor
  • track survey
  • population density estimation
  • tracker
  • wildlife
  • citizen science
  • abundance estimation
  • Kalahari
  • game count
  • day range
  • FMP formula

• Graduation date

  Spring 2020

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Doctor of Philosophy

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/r3-pfgz-1459

• License

  Permission is hereby granted to the University of Alberta Libraries to reproduce single copies of this thesis and to lend or sell such copies for private, scholarly or scientific research purposes only. Where the thesis is converted to, or otherwise made available in digital form, the University of Alberta will advise potential users of the thesis of these terms. The author reserves all other publication and other rights in association with the copyright in the thesis and, except as herein before provided, neither the thesis nor any substantial portion thereof may be printed or otherwise reproduced in any material form whatsoever without the author's prior written permission.