KATHMANDU — Researchers have found brown bears in part of Nepal not beforehand identified to host the species, prompting a name to guard this space as a bear “stronghold.”
The discovering, primarily based on camera-trap photos, additionally expands the identified vary of the brown bear (Ursus arctos) in Asia. It may additionally mark out the Limi Valley, in northwestern Nepal, as a “contact zone” between two subspecies of this apex predator, the researchers write in a newly printed research.
“The bears weren’t the species we primarily arrange the digital camera traps for,” research lead writer Naresh Kusi, from the Himalayan Wolves Challenge, instructed Mongabay.
As a part of their analysis, Kusi and his mission workforce have since 2021 run a community of 61 digital camera traps throughout an space within the Limi Valley that’s half the scale of London. Since then, they’ve recorded photos of species by no means earlier than confirmed outdoors Nepal’s protected areas, such because the steppe polecat (Mustela eversmanii), Pallas’s cat (Otocolobus manul) and Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx).
This time round, it’s the brown bear — a species discovered all through the Northern Hemisphere, however which is so vanishingly uncommon in Nepal, at an estimated 20 people, that it’s thought of critically endangered right here. But Kusi’s workforce managed to seize dozens of unbiased photos of brown bears of their camera-trapping surveys.
“Though we didn’t estimate the scale of the inhabitants in Limi Valley, primarily based on our research and different research on brown bears, we will say that the quantity we presently have seems to be like an underestimate,” Kusi stated.
They snapped a better variety of photos of their 2022-2023 survey than in 2021, seemingly due to the season, he added.
“In 2021, we had been there in the summertime season. However the subsequent 12 months we went there throughout spring,” Kusi stated, including that brown bears are identified to be extra energetic within the spring, when the snow hasn’t utterly melted but and other people don’t frequent the rangelands.
The researchers say the discovering is important, because it comes from a area located between the identified ranges of two brown bear subspecies: the Himalayan brown bear (U. a. isabellinus), discovered farther west in India and Pakistan, and the Tibetan brown bear (U. a. pruinosus), discovered additional north and east as much as Tibet.
“This means that the realm could also be a ‘contact zone’ between the 2 subspecies,” Kusi stated.
The researchers write of their research that the invention factors to “the importance of Limi Valley as a stronghold for brown bears in Nepal and underscore[s] the significance of formally defending the presently unprotected wildlife habitats in Limi Valley.”
They add that the photographed bears appeared to have the bodily traits of the Tibetan brown bear, together with a white “collar” (additionally described by some researchers as a yellow “scarf”) round its neck, and black ears. However a genetic evaluation could be wanted to verify which subspecies they belong to — or whether or not they’re a hybrid of the Tibetan and Himalayan subspecies if certainly the “contact zone” speculation is right.
Rajan Paudel, co-author of a latest research on potential bear habitats below a altering local weather in Nepal, agreed on the necessity for extra analysis into that speculation.
“One other fascinating facet to research is whether or not there are any obstacles within the Limi Valley and its environment that would have remoted brown bear populations to the east [Tibetan] and west [Himalayan] of the valley, resulting in the event of two separate subspecies,” he added.
Whereas Kusi and his workforce posit that their discovering expands the identified vary of brown bears in Nepal, analysis by Paudel and his workforce means that in a warming world, the general vary for the animals is more likely to shrink. Their research discovered that if the common international temperature rises on a trajectory to hit by 2.7° Celsius (4.9° Fahrenheit) by the tip of the century, brown bears in Nepal will lose greater than two-thirds of their present appropriate habitat by 2050, and 82% by 2070.
“Our research additional reveals the significance of saving the brown bears in Limi,” Paudel stated, echoing Kusi’s workforce’s name to guard the realm. “If we handle to take action, we may doubtlessly be saving each the Himalayan and the Tibetan brown bears.”
The presence of brown bears in Nepal is as legendary because the beliefs surrounding them. Till lately, the Tibetan subspecies had by no means been recorded within the nation. (But once more, it was a camera-trap survey that confirmed their presence in 2022.) Bears have additionally been pegged because the potential origin for the enduring Yeti fable.
Their presence within the Limi Valley provides to the wealth of wildlife nonetheless being uncovered within the space. The valley is positioned within the trans-Himalayan area, solely a small portion of which lies in Nepal, a rustic largely located south of the Himalayas. Analysis into the natural world of Nepal’s trans-Himalayan area, dwelling to iconic species comparable to snow leopards (Panthera uncia) and wild yaks (Bos mutus), has been restricted in comparison with the lower-elevation hills and plains, the place better-known species comparable to better one-horned rhinos (Rhinoceros unicornis) and Bengal tigers (Panthera tigris) are discovered.
Abhaya Raj Joshi is a employees author for Nepal at Mongabay. Discover him on @arj272.
Banner Picture: A captive Tibetan brown bear with the trademark yellowish scarf-like ‘collar’ round its neck. Picture by Aardwolf6886 by way of Flickr (CC BY-ND 2.0).
Citations:
Kusi, N., Gurung, S., Lama, D. T., Pathak, S., Pant, G., Timalsina, Okay., & Werhahn, G. (2024). New insights into the geographical distribution of brown bears Ursus arctos in Nepal. Oryx, 1-5. doi:10.1017/S0030605324000796
Baral, R., Adhikari, B., Paudel, R. P., Kadariya, R., Subedi, N., Dhakal, B. Okay., … Tsubota, T. (2024). Predicting the potential habitat of bears below a altering local weather in Nepal. Environmental Monitoring and Evaluation, 196(11). doi:10.1007/s10661-024-13253-2
This article by Abhaya Raj Joshi was first printed by Mongabay.com on 31 October 2024. Lead Picture: A captive Tibetan brown bear with the trademark yellowish scarf-like ‘collar’ round its neck. Picture by Aardwolf6886 by way of Flickr (CC BY-ND 2.0).
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