Size determines whether animals survive natural disasters
In May 2019, cyclone Idai made landfall in Mozambique’s Gorongosa National Park. Under normal circumstances, this would have been yet another devastating natural disaster.
However, this time, Princeton researchers had already installed trail cameras and animal-tracking devices in the location brimming with wildlife. This allowed them to investigate the phenomenon and draw some very interesting conclusions on how animals survive climate emergencies.
Real-time responses
“This is the first study that has ever been able to track the real-time responses of a large-mammal community to a natural disaster,” said Robert Pringle, a Department of Ecology and Environmental Biology professor who has worked with Gorongosa National Park since it was established.
“We watched the waters rise. We watched the animals’ reactions in the hours, days, weeks after the cyclone: how some of them escaped the floodwaters, and some of them didn’t.”
In order to help forest and wildlife management better predict the effects of severe weather occurrences, the researchers created a broader set of expectations in addition to a description of this particular event using the data they had collected before, during, and after the storm.
The research team discovered that size was the most reliable indicator of survival in natural disasters. They found that the population of the small oribi fell by half while 50 percent of the slightly larger reedbucks also perished.
In addition to being unable to outrun the floods’ overwhelming waves, the smaller animals could not buffer the subsequent dietary restrictions that followed the devastating weather event. Much of the low-lying flora and grasses were destroyed by the flood and unlike larger animals, which have greater fat on which to rely on, smaller animals were unable to endure those periods of nutritional withdrawal.
Recommendations
The researchers were able to deduce some recommendations for wildlife managers. The first was to move the tiniest and most ecologically delicate animals to safer regions ahead of storms.
The second was to supply more nutrition following the storm. When the grasses are completely submerged, animals will start feeding on less nutrient-dense bark and bushes, which will be too much for many tiny organisms to withstand.
Cyclone Idai was a powerful weather disaster that struck parts of Southeast Africa and was reported as one of the strongest tropical cyclones on record to make landfall in the southern hemisphere. The cyclone caused widespread devastation and destruction, resulting in a severe humanitarian crisis with significant impacts on Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Malawi, and surrounding regions.
Five countries came together to produce this research resulting in praise for the lead author.
“For me, the most exciting thing about this paper is the incredible collaboration between so many groups of researchers, from hydrology to large animal ecology, to create this really integrated piece of science,” Brown said. “The best work happens in collaborative projects.
Source: Interesting Engineering
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Size determines whether animals survive natural disasters