Heterogeneous landscapes harboring mosaics of natural habitat and agriculture are increasingly gaining conservation focus in the tropics. While research on cash crops such as coffee, rubber, and oil palm has led to an understanding of their role as supplementary habitats, such has remained limited in cashew plantations despite it being a cash crop of global significance. We conducted a study to understand the occurrence of terrestrial mammal species in a mixed forest–cashew landscape in the northern Western Ghats, India. During January to April 2016, we used trail cameras to sample a total area of 25 km2 divided into 100 grid cells of 0.25 km2 each. We deployed six trail cameras for a 24 h period in each grid cell and obtained photo-captures of 11 species in forests, of which nine were detected in cashew plantations, but most species showed low capture rates. For three of these species—Indian crested porcupine, sambar, and wild pig—we modeled habitat use as a function of site-specific attributes. Wild pig showed a higher probability of use of cashew than forest, while porcupine and sambar did not show any pronounced differences between the two land uses. The probability of habitat use by sambar and porcupine was positively influenced by undergrowth but not for the wild pig. Wild pig habitat use was positively related to increased proximity of human settlements and increasing distance to forests, but the pattern was unreliable for sambar and porcupine. Our preliminary study demonstrates that a subset of terrestrial mammals in the forest makes use of cashew plantations and highlights the need for further research in forest–cashew landscapes to assess conservation opportunities.

中文翻译：

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哺乳动物在混合森林-腰果景观中利用腰果种植园

包含自然栖息地和农业马赛克的异质景观越来越受到热带地区的保护。虽然对咖啡、橡胶和油棕等经济作物的研究使人们了解了它们作为补充栖息地的作用，但尽管腰果是一种具有全球意义的经济作物，但在腰果种植园中的作用仍然有限。我们进行了一项研究，以了解印度西高止山脉北部森林-腰果混合景观中陆生哺乳动物物种的出现情况。2016 年 1 月至 4 月期间，我们使用轨迹相机对 25 平方公里的总面积进行采样，分为 100 个网格单元，每个单元为 0.25 平方公里。我们在每个网格单元中部署了六个跟踪摄像头，持续 24 小时，并在森林中捕获了 11 种物种的照片，其中在腰果种植园中检测到了 9 种，但大多数物种表现出低捕获率。对于其中三个物种——印度冠豪猪、水鹿和野猪——我们将栖息地使用建模为特定地点属性的函数。野猪使用腰果的概率高于森林，而豪猪和水鹿在这两种土地使用上没有表现出任何明显的差异。水鹿和豪猪利用栖息地的可能性受到灌木丛的积极影响，但对野猪没有影响。野猪栖息地的利用与人类住区的距离增加和与森林的距离增加呈正相关，但这种模式对于水鹿和豪猪来说是不可靠的。