Effect of theWenchun earthquake on habitat use patterns of the giant panda in the minshan.pdf

Biological Conservation 145 (2012) 241–245 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Biological Conservation journal homepage: /locate/biocon Effect of the Wenchuan earthquake on habitat use patterns of the giant panda in the Minshan Mountains, southwestern China Wen Zheng a,b,1, Yu Xu a,b,1, Lihuan Liao a,b, Xuyu Yang c, Xiaodong Gu c, Tao Shang d, Jianghong Ran a,b,⇑ a Key Laboratory of Conservation Biology on Endangered Wildlife of Sichuan Province, College of Life Science, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610064, China b Key Laboratory of Bio-Resources and Eco-Environment of Ministry Education, College of Life Science, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610064, China c Sichuan Wildlife Conservation Station, Chengdu 610081, China d Management Office of Longxi-Hongkou National Nature, Dujiangyan 611830, China a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: The Wenchuan earthquake of May 2008 was a severe natural disaster that caused significant damage to Received 11 April 2011 the habitat of the endangered giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca ) inhabiting southwestern China. How- Received in revised form 25 November 2011 ever, the effect of the earthquake on giant pandas is understudied. We took advantage of our long-term Accepted 27 November 2011 dataset on panda habitat use in the Minshan Mountains to investigate panda response to this disaster. We Available online 20 December 2011 analyzed the habitat use patterns of giant pandas over the course of a 6-year period (5 years pre-earth-