Title
Kirghiz and Wakhi Livestock in the Afghan Pamirs in 2007
Author(s)
Ostrowski, S., A.M. Rajabi and H. Noori
Abstract
During 2006 and 2007, the WCS Ecosystem Health Team set about examining the livestock owned by the Wakhi & Kirghiz communities living in the mountaineous regions of the Afghan Pamirs. The goals were three-fold and involved studying the livestock population through structured interviews with the owners, determining seasonal patterns in range use, and assessing the overall health of the population in terms of diseases and predation. Livestock health has a direct impact on the health of the surrounding wildlife so these studies can help inform conservation strategies in the long-term. A training exercise was also initiated to teach Wakhi herders how to use GPS systems in tracking the movements of their own livestock. The results were promising and have vastly improved WCS' knowledge on range-use during the seasons. Climatic data were also collected, forming the first ever set of such data for this area.
Keywords
Wakhan, Big Pamir, Wakhi community, livestock density, transhumance, predation, infectious disease, seasonal forage, wild ungulates, climatic data
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DMX626500000