The impact of human activities on the environment is resulting in the alteration of major macroecological
patterns that characterize life on Earth, including the loss of top predators and other apex consumers. Mammals, in particular, have experienced serious declines, with 1317 (26%) species now considered to be threatened with extinction by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. Poaching and illegal trade on mammals are mostly due to the demand from growing human populations, increasing trade of wild meat, and higher human accessibility to derive food and medicinal products, ornamental items and pets. These affect 53% of threatened mammals, including iconic, keystone and umbrella species like the tiger (Panthera tigris), pangolins (Manis spp.), rhinos and elephants. A literature search will be done to select relevant studies published from 1970 that report spatial data on poaching. Information retrieved will include: 1) the name of the species affected by poaching, 2) the location of the event (coordinates, toponym, map) 3) the type of data (e.g finding of dead individuals, part of poached individuals, assumption based on distance from hunters¿ access points, evidence of hunting on similar species etc) in order to assign different levels of uncertainty, 4) the date in which the event has been recorded and 5) the level of protection of the area. Each species will be then assigned to one or more `use and trade¿ classes (i.e. food, pet, medicine, decorative items, trophies),
retrieved from the IUCN Species Information Service, to extrapolate additional poaching locations for species with insufficient data that co-occur with data-rich species. In this way, each species for which the poaching threat is applicable will have a map of recent poaching evidence. By including the information related to the date in which poaching has started/been detected in an area, a map of change in poaching occurrence within the combined range will be created for each species.
- Very limited availability of data on past species¿ distribution. So far, the most common ways to spatially represent the recent effects of anthropogenic pressures on species¿ distribution make use of the IUCN threat classification scheme (or similar classifications), in combination with species ranges, to produce richness maps of threatened species (e.g., Schipper et al. 2008 produced maps for all major threats to mammals, Bellard et al. 2016 for species threatened by invasive alien species, Ripple et al. 2016 for species threatened by bushmeat hunting), or overlap the threat map with species¿ ranges/ habitats (Crooks et al. 2017) to identify hotspots of risk. More refined methods account for changes in threats over time, but the impacts of these changes are investigated within the boundaries of the current range (e.g., Gallego-Zamorano et al. 2020), leading to a likely underestimation of the effects on species¿ distribution. I will expand the Pacifici et al. (2019) database of distribution ranges for terrestrial mammals in the 1970s-1980s by including additional species to the sample. This will include bats (see for example Pacifici et al. 2020b, that already contains 33 species belonging to the order Chiroptera) and another 100 species for which I was able to gather additional distribution data relative to that period, plus additional species from sources not yet explored (e.g., Databank for the Conservation and Management of the African Mammals; Boitani et al. 1999). I will consider both the current and the past ranges for a taxonomically and geographically representative group of mammal species to estimate the magnitude of the major threats in there, identify areas subject to different threats and those that would require specific conservation interventions.
- No map of poaching occurrence exists. Poaching or overhunting are very often cited as threats, but rarely backed up by hard data. In fact, no map of poaching occurrence within species¿ ranges exists. Collecting spatial data on this pressure will probably be the most challenging part of the project. Data will be collected from published papers, dedicated database available upon request (e.g., TRAFFIC Wildlife Trade Information System), IUCN action plans. My long experience at the Global Mammal Assessment (GMA) program for the global reassessment of the conservation status of mammals in the Red List also gave me the possibility to work with the major species¿ international experts, who will be contacted to obtain additional information, and for the validation of data collected (as I did for the Pacifici et al. 2019 paper).