IUCN / SSC Cat Specialist Group - Digital Cat Library |
|
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
|
| Karanth, K.U.; Sanderson, E.; Funston, P. | |
| Many Ways of Skinning a Cat: Methods and Tools for Studying Wild Felids | |
| 2007 Conference Proceeding | |
Wild cats seriously challenge curious researchers: their secretiveness, nocturnal habits, scarcity and solitary nature are like the proverbial skin that can be peeled off in several different ways. Cats can be studied as individuals to understand their diets, habitat choice, space use and social systems. Their populations can be examined to estimate parameters like densities, vital rates and other facets of dynamics. At a landscape level, changes in geographical range, occupancy, extinctions and other meta-population phenomena become study objectives. Here we review an array of field natural-history methods, survey techniques and equipment that scientists have developed to address these challenges. They cover tools that range from observation of cats or their spoor, collecting scats or kills, to more invasive techniques like capture, immobilization and radio-tagging. At the level populations, additional techniques ranging camera-trap and faecal DNA sampling are employed. At the spatial scale of landscapes, cat studies can involve simple questionnaires or any of the other advanced invasive and non-invasive tools. Finally, a powerful array of intellectual tools that synthesize ideas from various allied sciences such as biostatistics, information theory, modeling and geography can now be innovatively combined with field techniques, to unveil the hitherto secret lives of wild cats. |
|
 |
PDF files are only accessible to Friends of the Cat Group. Joining Friends of the Cat Group gives you unlimited access and downloads in the Cat SG Library for one year, and allows you to receive our newsletter Cat News (2 regular issues per year plus special issues). More information how to join here |
(c) IUCN/SSC Cat Specialist Group ( IUCN - The World Conservation Union) |