Compound Ecoclimatic Events: The Long‐Term Recovery of Conservation‐Priority Mammals After an Extreme Ice Storm Event Was Promoted by the Alleviation of Poaching
Longitudinal ecological study reveals anti-poaching enforcement enhances post-storm mammal recovery, indicating that human pressure mitigation is critical after extreme climatic events.
Key Points
To assess how an extreme ice storm damaged subtropical mammal communities and determine whether subsequent anti-poaching enforcement promoted long-term population recovery.
Analyzed 15 years of continuous mammal monitoring data (2005–2019) across subtropical China spanning an extreme ice storm event in 2008.
Evaluated changes in community dynamics and species richness across primary and degraded forests before and after targeted anti-poaching legal enforcement began in 2012.
The 2008 ice storm caused an immediate 35% decline in overall mammal species richness and abundance, with a 50% loss among conservation-priority species, all of which were obligate herbivores.
Degraded forests exhibited markedly slower recovery trajectories than primary forests and failed to regain dynamic community stability at pre-storm population levels.
Anti-poaching legal enforcement in 2012 drove a significant shift toward higher conservation-priority species representation, reversing long-term declines particularly in degraded habitats.