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During the period September 1997 – October 1998, I was involved as a postdoc research fellow in a conservation project in northern California, coordinated by Prof Barrett (University of California at Berkeley) and Mike Jaeger (US Fish and Wildlife Service). The project was aimed at estimating the density of large-sized predators using photo-trapping, a non invasive and promising fauna monitoring technique. |
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Apart from the interest of this
technique relatively to applied ecology and field conservation, using
photo-traps was a real fun, because I could detect and see fauna that otherwise
I would have never seen by sight, i.e. the medium- and large-sized mammals
occurring within the wildlands of northern California. Below you can see a
small sample of pictures I was able to take during that study period.
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Bobcat Lynx
rufus |
Bobcat Lynx
rufus |
Mountain
lion Puma concolor |
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Mountain
lion Puma concolor |
Black bear Ursus americanus |
Black bear Ursus
americanus |
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Coyote Canis latrans |
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… and the one below is a wolf “caught” on the Appennini mountain range
near Florence (45 min drive from town), in November 1998. At that time, my
friend and collegue Duccio Berzi (Center
for the Study and Documentation of the Wolf) started using (artisanal)
camera-traps - and I helped and advised him on how to optimize the results.
As you can see below, it was a good start indeed!
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Wolf Canis lupus |
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In the Syrian desert I have also been trying to get nice shots of fauna
using the camera traps – but I faced an hardship because 1) in a flat and
barren terrain wildlife is not forced to use specific trails, so I had to use
attractants (and this is more difficult), 2) large-sized predators are super-wary
and secretive, as they are heavily persecuted by humans in this part of the
world.
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Wild cat Felis
silvestris lybica |
Sand
cat Felis margarita
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Ruppell’s fox Vulpes
rueppellii |
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Red fox Vulpes
vulpes |
Asiatic jackal Canis
aureus |
Arabian oryx
Oryx leucoryx |
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oryx in the
mist … |
Sand gazelle Gazella subgutturosa marica |
Cape hare Lepus
capensis |
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Surveying the steppe during winter
time … |
Opportunistical finding of livestock road kills was a great chance for baiting camera traps to aim at large predators … |
References
Serra G., Jaeger M.M., Barrett
R.H., Conner M., Kucera E. In
preparation. Photographic mark-resight surveys to census bobcat (Lynx rufus) populations.
Serra G., Jaeger
M.M., Barrett R.H. In preparation. Detecting and censusing coyote (Canis latrans) populations using infrared-triggered cameras.
photos by G. Serra
(except the wolf in Tuscany, by Duccio
Berzi)
Last updated on 8 February 2005