Crowned sifaka population on the verge of local extinction: dispatch from the field
Josia Razafindramanana, special to mongabay.comSeptember 08, 2009
Interviews with local people revealed that once several groups of the species resided in the corridor, and even last year, about 20 individuals were still found there. However, within one year, the population dropped from 20 to 6 individuals.
Hunting of the crowned sifaka is taboo in the area, but other activities, such as mining, charcoal production and logging have devastated the corridor. Currently 70 percent of the forest is degraded.
 Crowned sifaka in the degraded forest. Photo by: Josia Razafindramanana. |
Currently, logging activity is the main threat, since the forest contains many precious trees highly valuable for trade. Large trees over 20 meters in height have disappeared in a very short time, and they continue to be cut down to clear areas for charcoal production or to be burned to extract gold from rocks. On average one tree per day is cut, resulting in a dramatic decline in forest cover.
The livelihood of the local people is gold mining. Artisanal mining occurs all over the corridor, thus forest regeneration is very low due to this exploitation by people from nearby Miandrivazo and Antananarivo.
 Forest destruction. Photo by: Josia Razafindramanana. |
Besides widespread habitat destruction, hunting and live capture for the illegal pet trade also threaten remaining populations. Only a few populations of this species exist in the Antrema forest, North of Katsepy, and in Anjamena forests (Mittermeier, 2006). A recent study survey of the crowned sifaka shows a density of 48 groups/km² and 173 individuals/km² in Anjamena, using transect line sampling (Muller et al., 2000).
 Crowned sifaka in captivity. |
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