Drivers of Illegal Hunting in a Megadiverse Protected Area: Integrating Local Knowledge and Spatial Modeling in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest

We integrated local knowledge from park rangers with spatial modeling (MaxEnt) to identify drivers and hotspots of hunting activity in the Serra do Conduru State Park (PESC), a megadiverse forest fragment of the Atlantic Forest in southern Bahia. Our findings show that hunting is widespread across the park, with the southernmost region and the western boundary identified as high-priority areas for monitoring. Altitude, proximity to rivers, and forest cover were the main drivers of hunting, which occurred mainly at higher altitudes (~ 300 masl) and predominantly in well-conserved, mature forests near rivers. Integrating rangers’ knowledge with spatial data has proven crucial for understanding hunter behavior and identifying vulnerable areas, thereby supporting key management actions in our study area.