Lighting up mountain coexistence: Understanding the effects of environment and livestock on habitat use by Andean bear in a conflict zone in Peruvian Andes

Abstract

In Tropical Andes, livestock predation is the main cause of conflict between Andean bears (Tremarctos ornatus) and humans. In central Peru, the small village of San Pedro de Churco, located in buffer zone of Pampa Hermosa National Sanctuary, has experienced a conflict with Andean bears since 2013 due to the livestock depredation of cattle. To create a baseline for formulating mitigation measures, we seek to analyze which environmental and anthropogenic characteristics best explain the habitat use by the Andean bear in this conflict region. Using camera traps, transects, and occupancy modeling, we distributed 16 sampling units in the conflict area from May 2019 to November 2020. We collected seven variables: slope, forest cover, the occurrence of Puya bromeliads, livestock abundance, distance from S.P. Churco village, distance to trails, and rainfall. We expected that variables linked to food resources would have a large explanatory weight (w+) positively on habitat use by the Andean bear, while anthropogenic variables would have a negative impact on the species' habitat use due to disturbances caused by human activity. Our results demonstrated the importance of maintaining the cloud forests (w+=0.61) and the high-Andean grasslands with Puya (w+=0.66) for the establishment of the Andean bear in conflict areas, in addition to the effect of seasonality (w+=0.63) on the use of different habitats and the resource availability for the species. However, the presence of abundant livestock (w+=-0.64) may be causing the displacement of bears, negatively impacting the availability of their habitats in conflict zones. The habitat use rate by bears across the study area was 0.69 with a detectability of 0.15, and we identified six individuals through the body marks. Based on the results and the conflict landscape, we mapped the focal areas sampling with the greatest potential for livestock depredation by Andean bears and the implications for management and coexistence. Measures that conserve cloud forests and the Puya grasslands, as well as more sustainable and profitable livestock management practices can be prioritized to reduce human-bear conflict in the region.