The Asian Elephant: Ecology and ManagementThe Asian elephant has had a unique cultural association with people. Unfortunately, elephants and people have also been in conflict, resulting in the decline in elephants throughout their former range in Southern Asia. This book provides an ecological analysis of elephant human interaction and its implications for the conservation of elephants. The foraging habits of elephants and their impact on vegetation are considered, along with the interactions that occur between elephants and humans. The ecological data provide the basis for recommendations on elephant conservation and management, keeping in view the socio-economic imperatives of the Asian region.This first comprehensive account of Asian elephant ecology will be of particular interest to conservation biologists and mammalogists. |
Contents
The historical background | 1 |
11 The period before Christ | 2 |
12 The period after Christ | 4 |
13 Elephants captured during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries | 8 |
Status and distribution of the Asian elephant | 10 |
21 Indian subcontinent | 11 |
215 Bangladesh | 18 |
23 Island Asia | 24 |
76 Quantity of crops damaged and the economic loss | 123 |
77 Methods to deter elephants and their behavioural responses | 125 |
78 Crop raiding in rain forest habitats | 126 |
79 Causes of crop raiding | 130 |
Manslaughter by elephants | 135 |
82 The elephants responsible | 136 |
83 Circumstances of encounter | 137 |
84 Causes of aggression | 140 |
24 Summary of population estimates | 29 |
25 Conservation issues | 32 |
The main study area and study methods | 39 |
31 The study area | 40 |
32 Study methods | 54 |
Movement and habitat utilization | 60 |
42 Movement pattern of different clans | 62 |
43 Home range sizes and factors influencing them | 63 |
44 Interannual differences in movement pattern | 65 |
46 Seasonal use of habitat types | 66 |
47 Movement in relation to foraging and availability of water | 67 |
Feeding and nutrition | 69 |
52 Proportions of browse and grass in the diet | 71 |
53 Proportions of different browse plants in the diet | 74 |
54 Quantity of forage consumed | 78 |
55 Drinking | 79 |
56 Nutrition and foraging | 80 |
Impact on the vegetation and carrying capacity | 86 |
61 Primary production of grasses | 87 |
62 Biomass of mammalian herbivores and grass consumption | 89 |
63 Impact on woody vegetation | 91 |
64 Interspecific competition resource limitation and carrying capacity | 97 |
65 Elephantvegetation interaction and ecosystem dynamics | 99 |
Crop raiding by elephants | 108 |
72 The crops consumed and patterns of feeding | 111 |
73 Frequency and seasonality of raiding | 114 |
74 Group sizes of raiding elephants | 116 |
75 Quantity consumed from crop fields | 120 |
Habitat manipulation by people | 143 |
92 Shifting cultivation | 144 |
93 Extraction of plant products | 145 |
94 Grazing by domestic livestock | 150 |
95 Fire | 151 |
96 Forest plantations | 154 |
97 Food availability in primary versus secondary rain forest | 157 |
99 Creation of water reservoirs | 159 |
Elephant slaughter by people | 165 |
102 Causes of death in elephants | 166 |
103 Number age frequency and mean tusk weight of poached elephants | 168 |
104 The people responsible | 169 |
105 Poaching and the ivory trade in India | 170 |
Population dynamics | 174 |
111 Age and sex structure | 175 |
112 Fertility | 177 |
113 Mortality | 182 |
114 Population modelling | 188 |
predicted and observed trends in the proportion of adult males | 197 |
Conservation and management | 202 |
122 Protection of human interests | 211 |
Estimation of seasonal elephant densities by ground transects | 219 |
Growth relationships and field methods of ageing elephants | 224 |
Nutritive value of food plants | 227 |
Population viability analysis | 230 |
| 234 | |
| 244 | |
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Common terms and phrases
Acacia Acacia leucophloea adult bulls adult male African elephant age class age distribution age structure annual Asia Asian elephant bamboo bark biomass Burma captured carrying capacity conservation consumed crop raiding Cymbopogon damage deciduous deciduous forest diet dry deciduous dry season Eastern Ghats elephant density elephant habitat elephant population elephant's elephant/km² estimated family herds feeding female elephants female mortality finger millet fire Forest Department grassland grazing Grewia tiliaefolia growth rate habitat habitat types Hasanur herbivores hills home range increase ivory Karnataka km² Kolipalya Mahaweli Mahaweli Ganga Malaysia male elephants male mortality mammals mortality rate Moyar Moyar river National Park Nilgiris number of elephants Olivier plantations poaching production proportion protein Punjur rain forest rainfall region reservoirs sample Satyamangalam sex ratio shifting cultivation short grass southern India species Sri Lanka Sukumar Table tall grass Tamilnadu Themeda trees tusks villages wet season wild Zone 12