Abstract
This chapter provides an integrative overview of the occupancy and density of Neotropical mammals on the southern boundary of the Atlantic Forest and the Brazilian–Uruguayan Savanna. We demonstrate the application of different hierarchical modeling approaches to assess the impact of anthropogenic land-use changes on the occupancy, abundance, and density of fossorial, flying, and terrestrial mammals, specifically armadillos, bats, and carnivorans, particularly small cats. These analytical methods allowed us to draw ecological and conservation conclusions for each of the groups studied. Our results show that land-use changes have different effects on the occupancy and density of the different species studied. Overall, our results provide valuable insights into the ecology and conservation of Neotropical mammals in human-dominated landscapes. In the future, several research directions can be pursued, including investigating the mechanisms underlying the differential impacts of anthropogenic landscape changes and disturbance, as well as the ecological and conservation requirements of different mammal species.
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Acknowledgments
We thank all authors of the cited papers, especially Victoria Graves, Paula Horn, and Gisele Bolze. This study was supported by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) – Finance Code 001. We also acknowledge financial support from Panthera, Fundação Grupo O Boticário and The Rufford Foundation. F.P.T. was supported by PNPD/CAPES. C.C. and M.G.O. received Msc scholarships from the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) and CAPES, respectively. M.J.R.P. was supported by a CNPq productivity grant.
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Tirelli, F.P., da Costa, C., Oliveira, M.G., Ramos Pereira, M.J. (2023). Tales from Southern Brazil: Hierarchical Modeling of Occupancy, Abundance, and Density of Atlantic Forest and Pampa Mammals. In: Mandujano, S., Naranjo, E.J., Andrade Ponce, G.P. (eds) Neotropical Mammals. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-39566-6_4
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