Although tropical forests cover only 6% of Earth's arable surface, they account for nearly 50% of all known species (National Research Council, 1992). Despite this diversity, these systems are increasingly threatened, as exemplified by a recent Food and Agriculture Organization report (FAa, 1999) which indicates that tropical countries are losing 127,300 km2 of forest annually; this does not co...

Papua New Guinea (PNG) covers a land area of over 450,000 square kilometers (km2). Approximately 12.5% of its 7.16 million people live in urban areas. In 2012, the per capita gross domestic product of PNG was estimated at 4,500 Kina ($1,629).1 Port Moresby, PNG’s capital city, which is the focus of this study, is located on the southeastern coast on the Gulf of Papua. It has a geographic area o...

Run-of-the-river hydroelectric dams cause changes in seasonal inundation of the floodplains, and this may cause displacement of semi-aquatic vertebrates present before dam construction. This study evaluated the movement of crocodilians before and after the filling of the Santo Antônio hydroelectric reservoir on the Madeira River in the Brazilian Amazon, which occurred in November 2011. We radio...

Accurate estimates of forest cover and forest fragmentation are critical for developing countries such as Costa Rica, which holds four to five percent of the world’s plant and bird species. We estimated forest cover for Costa Rica using Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper satellite scenes acquired between 1986 and 1991. In 1991, 29 percent (ca 14,000 km2) of the land cover of Costa Rica was closed forest...

Robust quantitative estimates of land use and land cover change are necessary to develop policy solutions and interventions aimed towards sustainable land management. Here, we evaluated the combination of Landsat and L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data to estimate land use/cover change in the dynamic tropical landscape of Tanintharyi, southern Myanmar. We classified Landsat and L-band SA...

Lake Chad commonly serves as a major hub of fertile economic activities for the border communities and contributes immensely to the national growth of all the countries that form its boundaries. However, incessant and multi-decadal drying via climate change pose greater threats to this transnational water resource, and adverse effects on ecological sustainability and socio-economic status of th...

landslides and slope instabilities are major hazards for human activities often causing economiclosses and property damages. sikan river basin (ilam province) due to the topography, tectonic,lithology, and climate has enough potential for occurrence of this phenomenon. the objectives of thisstudy were to determine effective parameters controlling the landslide occurrence and to preparezonation ...

Abstract: Surveys were carried out for chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii, in the areas of Ntakata (300 km2 between the Mkamba River and the Lubalisi River, 05°45′ –06°15′ S, 30°00′ –30°15′ E), and Kakungu (200 km2 between the Lubalisi River and the sources of the Rubufu River, 05°55′ –06°15′ S, 30°00′ –30°15′ E), Tanzania, during the dry seasons of 2001 and 2003. The predominant veget...

Between August and November 2009, eight cases of classical swine fever (CSF) occurred in young wild boar in a 25-km2 oak forest3 km south of the river Danube in the north-eastern part of Bulgaria. The wild boar population within the affected area was estimated to be 156 animals, or approximately six boar per km2. To control and eradicate the disease, and in addition to vaccination and hunting, ...

We present information on the distribution of the endemic Bolivian primates Callicebus olallae and C. modestus based on a series of site visits in the Beni Department. Callicebus olallae was registered at four localities and C. modestus at 11 localities, and in combination with negative data and localities for other Callicebus species in the region we defined the distributional boundaries for b...