Non-invasive monitoring of steroid hormones in wildlife for conservation and management of endangered species — A review

Global ecosystems and their constituent flora and fauna are experiencing a decline of biodiversity due to destruction of habitats, climate change, pollution, and invasive species. Of late, the number of species that have become critically endangered has increased extremely, and these species need to be protected from extinction in the wild. The conservation efforts should involve both in situ, and ex situ conservation and management of populations. Conservation physiology, an emerging multidisciplinary field, helps conservationists understand the physiological responses of endangered species due to the changes in the environment and thereby look for possible options of intervention to save them from extinction. This review summarizes various non-invasive hormone methods and endocrine studies involved in the conservation of endangered animals. The non-invasive hormone method has been successfully used in understanding basic reproductive biology, pregnancy diagnostics and welfare of a wide range of animals in captivity and in free-ranging habitats. This technique would directly or indirectly help in the conservation of endangered animals. This review also sheds light on non-invasive hormone monitoring in effective management and conservation of the endangered species.

Mammalian gastrointestinal parasites in rainforest remnants of Anamalai Hills, Western Ghats, India.

Habitat fragmentation is postulated to be a major factor influencing infectious disease dynamics in wildlife populations and may also be responsible, at least in part, for the recent spurt in the emergence, or re-emergence, of infectious diseases in humans. The mechanism behind these relationships are poorly understood due to the lack of insights into the interacting local factors and insufficient baseline data in ecological parasitology of wildlife. Here, we studied the gastrointestinal parasites of nonhuman mammalian hosts living in 10 rainforest patches of the Anamalai Tiger Reserve, India. We examined 349 faecal samples of 17 mammalian species and successfully identified 24 gastrointestinal parasite taxa including 1 protozoan, 2 trematode, 3 cestode and 18 nematode taxa. Twenty of these parasites are known parasites of humans. We also found that as much as 73% of all infected samples were infected by multiple parasites. In addition, the smallest and most fragmented forest patches recorded the highest parasite richness; the pattern across fragments, however, seemed to be less straightforward, suggesting potential interplay of local factors.