Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
macaque group size that is in accordance with a review of numerous studies
in free-ranging conditions (Fooden,
1995
). Although we made an exhaustive
survey in these regions, we may have missed as many troops as we found.
Therefore we generated a maximum estimate that was two times are count to
factor in the likelihood that we missed up to 50 percent of the groups occurring
in the region.
In the Rakhine and southern Tanintharyi regions, we estimated the total
population in lowland forests by using a strip transect method. The param-
eters obtained from trip surveys were the distance we covered (L) and the
number of sites (n) where long-tailed macaques were reported. Forest cover
area was obtained from the most recent existing statistics (Leimgruber
et al
.,
2005
). Our suppositions were as follows: the strip width was 10 km, troop size
was 30 individuals, and 50 percent and 33 percent of the forested areas were
habitable for long-tailed macaques in the southern Tanintharyi and Rakhine
regions, respectively. The proportions of habitable area were determined by
assessing the development of forest and influence of human activities. The
density was established as 5n/L individuals/km
2
. The minimum estimate was
then calculated as 3n/L*A for the southern Tanintharyi region and 1.5n/L*A
for the Rakhine region. Since the forest cover is decreasing from the year
of the report, the estimate was corrected by average decreasing rates; in ten
years, equaling 9 percent in southern Tanintharyi and 5 percent in Rakhine.
The maximum estimate was established at ten times the minimum to provide
a large buffer to avoid an underassessment of the population. However, man-
grove forests do not appear as heavily exploited by human activity as the other
types of lowland forests, therefore the populations of long-tailed macaques in
mangrove forests are estimated from the area of forest and a density calcu-
lated at ten times greater than other lowland forests in each region.
Results
Interview reports on distribution
We found positive records for long-tailed macaque in four of the seven bio-
geographic regions that we surveyed; Rakhine, Ayeyarwady Delta, Bago Yoma
and Tanintharyi (
Table 2.1
). We obtained reports on the occurrence of long-
tailed macaques at 98 villages (53.26 percent) of the 184 villages we visited
(
Table 2.2
and
2.3
). Overall, we found that the range of long-tailed macaques
in Myanmar stretches all along the coastal regions from northwestern 20˚32'N,
near the Bangladesh border, to the southernmost area, 9˚58'N (
Figure 2.2
).
The ranges of long-tailed macaques between the Rakhine, Ayeyarwady, and
