งานวิจัยและบทความ

Thailand's forests are now largely fragmented with few large intact areas remaining to support wide-ranging fauna such as tigers and other large mammals. Phu Khieo Wildlife Sanctuary, in Chaiyaphum Province, is at the center of one of the potentially important areas for the survival of large mammals in Thailand and mainland Southeast Asia. Intensive surveys using infrared-based camera-traps from May to July, 1998, revealed the presence of a single tiger and 16 other species of large mammals in a 40-km? area of the sanctuary near management facilities. Extensive sign searches and camera-trapping conducted over a 300-km? area during 1997 and 1998 confirmed the presence of the same individual tiger plus an additional 6 species of large mammals. The tiger had a minimum home range size of 78 km?. Despite intact forest cover, a diverse and abundant assemblage of potential prey, and a survey effort involving 1,886 trap-nights of sampling, the tiger population at Phu Khieo appears decimated and possibly non-viable in the long term. Tiger numbers are probably significantly lower than habitat models would predict. This situation may be the combined result of past hunting pressure and present day competition for prey with subsistence poachers and other carnivores. Phu Khieo Wildlife Sanctuary is a high priority area for mammal conservation in Thailand but management intervention is urgently required to avert the loss of tigers.