The Influence of Landscape and Microhabitat on the Diversity of Large- and Medium-Sized Mammals in Atlantic Forest Remnants in a Matrix of Agroecosystem and Silviculture
Fragmentation and destruction of a habitat are strongly relevant aspects to determine the richness and the dynamics of the mammals in ecosystems. This study, developed from October, 2010 to July, 2011 in three Atlantic Forest remnants in Ipumirim, SC, Brazil, aims at identifying the diversity of large- and medium-sized nonflying mammals and verifying associations of the patterns obtained with features of the researched areas. The approximate measurement of the inventoried areas is 51 ha. The data collection of the mammal fauna was obtained through direct registers, with the use of a photographical trap, and indirect records through the search of material that indicated the presence of species. The total amount of species studied was 13, pertaining to nine families: Canidae (1), Cebidae (1), Dasyproctidae (1), Dasypodidae (2), Didelphidae (2), Felidae (2), Mustelidae (2), and Procyonidae (2). In addition, landscape data was obtained through the development of a chorological matrix of the areas and the data about the microhabitats. From these data, 20 models for analysis were stipulated and this selection was determined with the corrected Akaike Information Criterion (AICc). The aspect of greater influence on the magnitude of the obtained data was the degree of human occupation in the landscape. 1. Introduction Several human activities are eroding ecosystems, species, and biological features in an alarming pace and such loss will certainly alter the way the ecosystems and their goods and services operate. This alteration, to different degrees, forces the ecosystems to critical thresholds tending to approximate to a problematic planetary scale. Besides that, there are very scarce data about the geographical and taxonomical distribution for most species, which have been called Wallacean and Linnean deficiencies, respectively. This perspective invariably shows that plenty of information on ecology is being lost, mainly in less known groups in tropical environments, previously to its understanding [1–4]. The fragmentation of tropical forests has a strong impact on biodiversity [5], with more than one-third of the species disappearing when the habitats are fragmented [6, 7]. By that means, the conservationist biology in fragmented tropical ecosystems has to concentrate not only on preserved areas, but also on managed ecosystems [8]. Throughout time, diversity tends to decrease and eventually reaches a less diverse steady state [9]. Several authors consider that habitat loss and fragmentation are the main factors for the decrease of diversity. For instance,
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