Title
Distribution of primates in Bolivia and priority areas for their conservation
Author(s)
Nohelia I. Mercado and Robert B. Wallace
Published
2010
Publisher
Tropical Conservation Science
Abstract
The main threats to the order Primates are habitat fragmentation and alteration, local hunting and illegal trade. These threats require adequate planning for primate conservation through the identification of priority areas based on patterns of richness and rarity from potential distribution models. In the present work, the potential distribution of 22 species of the order Primates present in Bolivia was predicted using a predictive model, Maxent. The model provided an inferred distribution using 1200 occurrence records correlated with environmental variables, and we confirmed this distribution by means of the ROC/AUC statistic. Potential conservation areas were identified as the northwest of the Department of Pando where the greatest diversity of species is found, including those with a high rarity index such as Callimico goeldii, Cebuella pygmaea and Saguinus imperator, and the west of the Department of Beni where the two endemic primate species of Bolivia are present: Callicebus olallae and Callicebus modestus. / The major threats for primates are habitat alteration and fragmentation, local hunting and illegal trade. These threats require conservation planning to identify priority areas based on species richness and rarity patterns from models of potential distribution. In this paper, the potential distribution for the 22 species of Bolivian primates are predicted through a predictive model, Maxent, which provided inferred distributions using 1200 presence records correlated with environmental variables and statistical ROC/AUC tests. The two priority potential conservation areas are the northwest of the Pando department where the highest diversity of species live, including the ones with the highest rarity score, such as Callimico goeldii, Cebuella pygmaea and Saguinus imperator, and western Beni where two Bolivian endemic species live, Callicebus olallae and Callicebus modestus.
Keywords
Potential conservation areas; species richness and rarity, potential distribution; Bolivia; Neotropical primates; Neotropical primates; Potential conservation areas; species richness and rarity, potential distribution; Bolivia; Neotropical primates
Access Full Text
A full-text copy of this article may be available. Please email the WCS Library to request.
![]()
Back
PUB35758