Dynamics Of The Giant Panda Habitat Suitability In Response To Changing Anthropogenic Disturbance In The Liangshan Mountains,China

Giant Panda is a unique rare wildlife in China,however,due to human disturbances and natural factors,the population has declined at one time.But,the results of the fourth survey showed the number of giant panda?Ailuropoda melanoleuca?has increased greatly,indicated that decades of panda conservation work has achieved remarkable results,which provided the basis for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature?IUCN?to down-list the giant panda's extinction risk from“endangered”to“vulnerable"However,the decision was controversial.Although the population has increased,pandas are still facing serious human disturbances?e.g.,livestock grazing and logging?.Human disturbance is a crucial factor affecting the survival of giant panda and their habitats,so evaluating the changes of habitat quality under this disturbance is vital to wildlife conservation.This paper interviewed and contrasted the basic economic situation of residents in two different types of communities?Yonghong village,which is close to the protected area and the Gaozhuoying village,which is far from the protected area?in Mabian Dafengding Nature Reserve,as well as whether they engaged in activities which will have impact on giant pandas'habitat?e.g.,livestock grazing,collection of bamboo shoots?to understand the impact of different types of disturbances caused by community residents on the habitat of giant pandas.Moreover,the quantification of human activity variables that result in habitat changes has been rare.To fill this knowledge gap,we used the g Liangshan Mountains as a case study.We combined data of human disturbance?i.e.,livestock grazing,logging,farming,collection of bamboo shoots,collection of medicinal plants,road construction?,environmental variables?i.e.,forest cover,elevation,slope?and panda GPS locational sites to evaluate change of panda habitat suitability and space use,the impact of human disturbance on panda habitat,and the distribution characteristics of human disturbances over time.Additionally,since most of the nature reserves of the Liangshan Mountains were established earlier,the functional zoning of the previous nature reserves was relatively rough based on the main protection species at that time and human disturbances.The times in the development,many factors have undergone profound changes,whether the functional zoning of the former nature reserve is reasonable or not requires a comprehensive evaluation according to the various realistic factors of the nature reserve in order to identify the problems that exist and thus contribute to biodiversity conservation.Therefore,this article took the Mabian Dafengding Nature Reserve as an example to evaluate the existing functional zoning,to explore the existing problems,and to give reasonable suggestions.The results of community interviews showed that:?1?the average household income of Yonghong village is significantly lower than that of Gaozhuoying village.?2?there are many types of human disturbance in Yonghong village,the most common one is collection of bamboo shoots,accompanied with a small number of collection of medicinal plants and livestock grazing.Moreover,collection of bamboo shoots accounts for a large proportion of household income,while the situation of Gaozhuoying village is that there is only one human disturbance-collection of bamboo shoots,which accounted for a small proportion of total household income while the source of income is mainly from migrant workers.?3?As for the various policies implemented by the government?e.g.,the Grain-to-Green Program,the Natural Forest Conservation Program,collecting bamboo shoots in rotation,prohibit grazing?,most of the community residents in the two townships know the name and the purpose of the policies,and are relatively satisfied with the relevant compensation methods and amount.The results of analyzing the dynamic changes of giant panda habitat suitability under anthropogenic disturbance showed that pandas'habitat suitability has improved,with substantial areas of stabilizing(1014.2km²)and increasing habitat(173.9km²)across our study areas in Liangshan Mountains between the National Giant Panda 3^rd survey?2000?to the National Giant Panda 4^th survey?2012?.Results from Maxent model showed that the percent contribution of human disturbance variables to panda habitat suitability decreased greatly from the 3^rd to 4^th survey?93.6%to 59.5%?,which was especially driven by the decrease in logging's contribution?78%to 19%?.The contribution value of environmental variables consequently increased?6.4%to 40.5%?,the largest growth occurring in the forest cover variable?2.7%to 14.2%?.Our results also indicated that panda space use expanded from the 3^rd to 4^th survey.It is concerning that human disturbances are still widely distributed and the percent contribution of some disturbance variables to panda habitat suitability increased.For example,livestock grazing went from a 1.4%to 13.1%contribution between the 3^rd and 4^th surveys,and indicated a need to be strengthen management in this area.The evaluation of functional zoning of the Mabian Dafengding Nature Reserve showed that the existing zoning can effectively protect most of the areas where giant pandas are active,but there are some traces of giant panda activity in the north and south of the buffer zone as well,it is recommended to be included in the core area.In addition,most of the traces of livestock grazing are located in the core area,and other human disturbances?e.g.,collection of bamboo shoots,collection of medicinal plants?are mainly distributed in the buffer zone and experimental area,and are rarely distributed in the core area,so it is urgent to manage the human disturbance in the core zone.The methods used in this study can also be applied to assess the impact of human disturbance on habitat quality for other species,and our results provided scientific support to relevant management departments for wildlife and biodiversity conservation in South-central China.