Large ungulates in tropical forests are among the most threatened taxa of mammals. Excessive hunting, degradation of and encroachments on their natural habitats by humans have contributed to drastic reductions in wild ungulate populations in recent decades. As such, reliable assessments of ungulate-habitat relationships and the spatial dynamics of their populations are urgently needed to provide a scientific basis for conservation efforts. However, such rigorous assessments are methodologically complex and logistically difficult, and consequently many commonly used ungulate population survey methods do not address key problems. As a result of such deficiencies, key parameters related to population distribution, abundance, habitat ecology and management of tropical forest ungulates remain poorly understood. This book addresses this critical knowledge gap by examining how population abundance patterns in five threatened species of large ungulates vary across space in the tropical forests of the Nagarahole-Bandipur reserves in southwestern India. It also explains the development and application of an innovative methodology – spatially explicit line transect sampling – based on an advanced hierarchical modelling under the Bayesian inferential framework, which overcomes common methodological deficiencies in current ungulate surveys. The methods and results presented provide valuable reference material for researchers and professionals involved in studying and managing wild ungulate populations around the globe.

Applied Hierarchical Modeling in Ecology: Analysis of Distribution, Abundance and Species Richness in R and BUGS, Volume Two: Dynamic and Advanced Models provides a synthesis of the state-of-the-art in hierarchical models for plant and animal distribution, also focusing on the complex and more advanced models currently available. The book explains all procedures in the context of hierarchical models that represent a unified approach to ecological research, thus taking the reader from design, through data collection, and into analyses using a very powerful way of synthesizing data. Makes ecological modeling accessible to people who are struggling to use complex or advanced modeling programs Synthesizes current ecological models and explains how they are inter-connected Contains numerous examples throughout the book, walking the reading through scenarios with both real and simulated data Provides an ideal resource for ecologists working in R software and in BUGS software for more flexible Bayesian analyses

This book reviews and synthesizes studies on local and regional occupancy and abundance of Neotropical mammals from central Mexico to South America. The book focuses primarily on addressing issues of a wide array of mammalian species from a population level in different habitats and ecosystems across the Neotropical region. Occupancy and abundance analyzed through hierarchical approaches with a variety of statistical tools are the central ecological parameters treated in the chapters of this volume. This book will be an updated reference for researchers, professionals, students, wildlife managers, and people interested in mammal ecology and conservation in tropical and subtropical regions.

Large terrestrial mammalian herbivores play critical roles in ecosystems by acting as regulators of energy and nutrient cycles, modulators of plant community composition and grassland-woodland transitions, agents of seed dispersal, and as prey for large carnivores. Though large herbivores represent a prominent component of mammalian assemblages throughout South and Southeast Asia, little is known about their roles in ecosystems in the region. This volume presents, for the first time, a collection of studies on the ecology of the rich and diverse large herbivore assemblages of South and Southeast Asia. Prepared by experts on herbivores of the region, it covers a comprehensive range of topics, including their evolutionary history, behavioural, nutritional, and population ecology, patterns of diversity across environmental gradients, roles as seed dispersers and regulators of plant growth, community compositions, and their conservation in the face of hunting and global change.

The Pasoh Forest Reserve (pasoh FR) has been a leading center for international field research in the Asian tropical forest since the 1970s, when a joint research project was carried out by Japanese, British and Malaysian research teams with the cooperation of the University of Malaya (UM) and the Forest Research Institute (FRI, now the Forest Research Institute Malaysia, FRIM) under the International Biological Program (IBP). The main objective of the project was to provide basic information on the primary productivity ofthe tropical rain forest, which was thought to be the most productive of the world's ecosystems. After the IBP project, a collaborative program between the University of Malaya and the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, UK, for post-graduate training was carried out at Pasoh. Reproductive biology of so me dipterocarp trees featured in many of the findings arrived at through the program, contributing greatly to progress in the population genetics of rain forest trees. Since those research pro grams, apart of the Pasoh forest and its field research station have been managed by FRIM. In 1984, FRIM started a long-term ecological research program in Pasoh FR with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) and Harvard University, establishing a 50-ha plot and enumerating and mapping all trees 1 cm or more in diameter at breast height. A recensus has been conducted every 5 years.

A beautifully illustrated reference work on the biology, ecology, conservation status and management of all thirteen species of wild cattle and buffalo. This book will be a valuable resource for students, researchers, and professionals in animal behaviour, behavioural ecology, evolutionary biology and conservation biology.