Journal of Threatened Taxa |
www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 June 2023 | 15(6): 23446–23448
ISSN 0974-7907
(Online) | ISSN 0974-7893 (Print)
https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.5591.15.6.23446–23448
#5591 | Received 13
January 2020 | Final received 12 May 2023 | Finally accepted 15 May 2023
Further photographic record of
Asiatic Brush-tailed Porcupine Atherurus macrourus Linnaeus, 1758 (Mammalia: Rodentia: Hystricidae) from Manas National
Park, Assam, India
Urjit Bhatt 1, Bilal Habib
2 & Salvador Lyngdoh 3
1–3 Department of Animal Ecology and Conservaton Biology, Wildlife Institute of India, PO Box
18, Dehradun, Uttarakhand 248001, India.
1 urjit@wii.gov.in, 2 bh@wii.gov.in,
3 salvador@wii.gov.in (corresponding author)
Editor: Anonymity requested. Date of publication: 26 June 2023 (online &
print)
Citation: Bhatt, U., B. Habib & S. Lyngdoh
(2023). Further
photographic record of Asiatic Brush-tailed Porcupine Atherurus
macrourus Linnaeus, 1758 (Mammalia: Rodentia: Hystricidae) from Manas National
Park, Assam, India. Journal of Threatened Taxa 15(6): 23446–23448. https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.5591.15.6.23446-23448
Copyright: © Bhatt et al. 2023. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. JoTT allows
unrestricted use, reproduction, and distribution of this article in any medium
by providing adequate credit to the author(s) and the source of publication.
Funding: Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), Department of Science & Technology (DST), New Delhi, India.
Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.
Acknowledgements: We are thankful to (Lt) Doyil Vengayil & Syed Asrafuzzaman, Department of Science and Technology,
Government of India, for financial assistance to carry out the study on the
Clouded Leopard Neofelis nebulosa. Paniram, Tejas, Chiging, Meban, and Saurav are thanked for their assistance in the
field. We thank the Forest Department, Government of Assam, and Bodoland
Territorial Council (BTC) for permissions and field support.
Three species of porcupines occur
in southern Asia: Indian Crested Porcupine Hystrix
indica, Himalayan Crestless Porcupine Hystrix brachyura,
and Asiatic Brush-tailed Porcupine Atherurus
macrourus (Molur
et al. 2005). Hystrix indica is found in most of the forested regions in
India (Agrawal 2000) but is restricted to only a few locations in northeastern
India (Talukdar et al. 2019). Hystrix brachyura is found in the forested areas of
northeastern India (Agrawal 2000) and northern Bengal (Mallick 2012) but is
absent from the other parts of India. Atherurus
macrourus is distributed across southern and
southeastern Asia (Molur 2020). In India, the species
was reported from Namdapha National Park (Agrawal 2000; Datta
et al. 2008a), Pakke Wildlife Sanctuary in
Arunachal Pradesh (Datta et al. 2008b), Intanki NP in Nagaland (Kumar & Kaul 2013), Ngengpui WS in Mizoram (Forest clearance 2013), and Khasi
Hills of Meghalaya (Agrawal 2000). In Assam, sporadic records of the species
were reported in Karbi Anglong,
North Chachar Hills, Garampani
WS, Nameri NP, and Manas NP
(Choudhury 2013). Despite continuous and extensive camera trap surveys and
other ecological research on carnivores and their prey base every year (Goswami & Ganesh 2014; Lahkar
et al. 2018, 2020a,b), there have been few photographic evidences and published
records of the species from Manas NP (Choudhury 2013;
Jhala et al. 2020). The current note presents the
recent photographic record of A. macrourus in
MNP.
Camera traps (n = 554) were
deployed in a grid size of 1X1 km2 for studying the Clouded Leopard
ecology at MNP from April 2017 to May 2019. MNP lies on the borders of the
Indo-Gangetic and Indo-Malayan biogeographic realms and is located at the
foothills of the Bhutan Himalayas in the Bhabar area
of western Assam (26.7460°N, 91.0203°E) (Wikramanayake
et al. 2001). Contiguous with Royal Manas National
Park (RMNP) in Bhutan, the park forms one of the large areas of conservation
significance in southern Asia. The vegetation of MNP can be broadly classified
into eastern wet alluvial grasslands, moist deciduous, and semi-evergreen
forests (Champion & Seth 1968).
At each location, a single Cuddeback X-Change colour camera
(Cuddeback, Green Bay, WI, USA) was affixed to a tree
at approximately 30–45 cm above the ground. Data from more than 500 camera-trap
stations were available for analysis, and the Asiatic Brush-tailed Porcupine
was recorded from two stations (91.1998°N, 26.8018°E and 91.1623°N, 26.7962°E)
with three independent captures (Figure 1 & Image 1). All captures occurred
at night (2145 h, 0331 h, and 2031 h), indicating nocturnal behaviour
(Image 1). The species was photo-captured in the Bhuyapara
range, the eastern part of the NP with a moist mixed deciduous forest type
dominated by Albizia procera,
Terminalia bellirica, and Bombax ceiba
(Figure 1). However, the species also inhabit other forests, such as tropical
wet evergreen, tropical semi-evergreen, and sub-tropical broadleaf hill
(Talukdar et al. 2019). As reported by the field director, Mr. H.K. Sarma, Manas Tiger Reserve, the
previous photographic evidence was recorded in the park by the front-line staff
with the help of Aaranyak, an NGO, in 2018 (Jhala et al. 2020).
Our recent photographic evidence
complements the previous occurrence and sporadic records of Asiatic
Brush-tailed Porcupine in Manas National Park. Since
the presence of the Asiatic Brush-tailed Porcupine in Manas
has not yet been published, Manas is not indicated in
the IUCN Red List distribution map for this species (Molur
2020). Though classified as ‘Least Concern’ on the IUCN Red List of Threatened
Species, the species is showing a decline in population across its range
primarily due to habitat loss, jhum (shifting) agriculture, small-scale
logging, subsistence harvesting for food, and accidental mortality (Molur et al. 2005). The Asiatic Brush-tailed Porcupine, one
of the least studied species in India, opens up the scope for further studies
and highlights the need for conservation efforts to protect them from
extinction.
For
figure & image - - click here for full PDF
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