No time to rest: How the effects of climate change on nest decay threaten the conservation of apes in the wild.

ABSTRACT: Since 1994, IUCN Red List assessments apply globally acknowledged standards to assess species distribution, abundance and trends. The extinction risk of a species has a major impact on conservation science and international funding mechanisms. Great ape species are listed as Endangered or Critically Endangered. Their populations are often assessed using their unique habit of constructing sleeping platforms, called nests. As nests rather than apes are counted, it is necessary to know the time it takes for nests to disappear to convert nest counts into ape numbers. However, nest decomposition is highly variable across sites and time and the factors involved are poorly understood. Here, we used 1,511 bonobo (Pan paniscus) nests and 15 years of climatic data (2003-2018) from the research site

SUBMITTER: Bessone M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8244864 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature