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Understanding the patchy distribution of four-horned antelope Tetracerus quadricornis in a tropical dry deciduous forest in Central India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 November 2013

Koustubh Sharma ,
Raghunandan Singh Chundawat ,
Joanna Van Gruisen  and
Asad Rafi Rahmani
Koustubh Sharma*
Affiliation:
Snow Leopard Trust, 4649 Sunnyside Avenue, North Suite #325, Seattle WA98103, USA Bombay Natural History Society, Hornbill House, Shahid Bhagat Singh Road, Mumbai 400001, India Nature Conservation Foundation, 3076/5, 4th Cross, Gokulam Park, Mysore 570002, India
Raghunandan Singh Chundawat
Affiliation:
Baagh Aap Aur Van, S-17 Panchsheel Apartments, A-1 Block, Panchsheel Enclave, New Delhi 110017, India
Joanna Van Gruisen
Affiliation:
Baagh Aap Aur Van, S-17 Panchsheel Apartments, A-1 Block, Panchsheel Enclave, New Delhi 110017, India
Asad Rafi Rahmani
Affiliation:
Bombay Natural History Society, Hornbill House, Shahid Bhagat Singh Road, Mumbai 400001, India
*
1Corresponding author. Email: koustubhsharma@gmail.com
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Abstract:

At the landscape level, the four-horned antelope is confined to tropical dry deciduous forests and within these, their distribution is patchy. Various factors have been proposed as determinants for their patchy distribution within landscapes, but none provided an adequate explanation. We hypothesized that availability of a constant supply of forage influenced the species distribution. We found that the four-horned antelope mainly fed on fruits and flowers, and that a total of 60% of the tree species in Panna Tiger Reserve bore fruits at different times of the year. High tree species richness in habitat patches was considered a surrogate for constant supply of forage for the four-horned antelope. Data from 547 sighting locations between 2002 and 2006 and six spatial layers were analysed using maximum entropy to produce a probability distribution model for the four-horned antelope in Panna Tiger Reserve. Our model predicted that habitat patches summing up to only 9.5% of the 543 km2 of Panna Tiger Reserve had high probability of distribution (>0.5) of four-horned antelope. Although all variables contributed to the distribution model of the four-horned antelope, explanatory power was highest for tree species richness within habitat patches. The distribution of four-horned antelope within tropical dry deciduous forests can be treated as an indicator of high tree diversity and hence habitat quality.

Keywords

distribution probabilityhabitat usemaxentPanna Tiger Reservetree species richness
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Tropical Ecology , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , January 2014 , pp. 45 - 54
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

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