(Note: this is
from the 1990 version the action plan
Click
here for the 2004 version of the
Canid Action Plan)
The Canid Action Plan is one in a series of such plans commissioned by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) and written by members of the Species Survival Commission's Specialist Groups. The authors of action plans have a clear remit: to provide current and accurate information that will help individuals, institutions, and governments to make educated decisions with the aim of ensuring the long-term survival of the species in question. To succeed in this objective, the authors of an action plan must first collect, collate, and synthesize the information available on the status, abundance, and distribution of the tax on under consideration. Only then can priorities be established and a plan for action developed.
Of course, before proceeding to these higher goals, there are some basics to be agreed upon. First, which species are to be recognized, and second, by which names are we to refer to them? These questions are not as trifling as they might at first appear, because classification of the family Canidae is moderately controversial (Wayne et al. 1989), and because there is a profusion of confusing common and Linnaean names. In Chapter 2, we discuss canid taxonomy, and outline the classification that we have adopted here at the species level. Although we have not, for the most part, gathered sufficient information to analyze conservation priorities at the level of subspecies, we have included a list of recognized subspecies and appropriate citations for those who wish to pursue questions of taxonomy and biogeography.
Some other Specialist Groups have organized the contents of their action plans on a regional basis. This makes good sense: for many species, policies are formulated on a regional basis. Hence, a regional approach allows policy makers in different areas to find, quickly, data which apply to their countries. Some action plans (e.g. the antelope plans, East 1988) are further divided into regional reports, each of which covets a small geographic area, providing a level of detail that is enviable. However, such an approach is not appropriate for the canids, and we have opted to organize the canid action plan differently. The reasons for this are several and stem from the basic biology of carnivores: first, predatory species occur at lower densities than prey; second, at any one location, the diversity of carnivore species is usually rather low, while third, the geographic ranges of many species of carnivore are rather large. In cast and northeast Africa, for instance, there are 59 species of antelope; on average, each country supports 26 species (East 1988). In contrast, these 59 species of antelope live side-by side with only six species of canid. Each country in the region supports, on average, four species.
These traits of canid distribution are not just regional, but global. There are only 34 canid species worldwide. The two continents with the highest species diversity, Africa and South America, each support a mere 10 species. Most species within the Canidae, have distributions that span at least a whole continent. One species, the red fox, is found throughout the Northern Hemisphere (and in Australia).
In deciding how to present our information we were impressed by the generalization that the status of a particular canid species appears to be remarkably consistent throughout its range. Red foxes are common, and thriving, wherever they occur; side-striped jackals are rare, but not threatened, throughout their range; the African hunting dog is nearly extirpated in every country where it is still found. There is a single exception with which to prove the rule: the grey wolf, common in northern Canada and Siberia, is threatened to a point verging on extirpation in much of its range.
Given the expansive geographical ranges of many canid species, and their relatively low species diversity, a country by country analysis of status, abundance, and distribution would be unwarranted and repetitive. Furthermore, it would be unworkable insofar as information on the status of canids is very scattered. For most countries, one simply could not write detailed reports because detailed information is unavailable. Our generalizations about status are based on the reports of our correspondents, who have reported species as being rare, threatened, or abundant. Only in that small minority of cases for which detailed surveys have been completed (e.g. the African wild dog (Frame and Fanshawe in prep.)) or where an entire Specialist Group is devoted to a single species (the grey wolf is the quality of the information remotely satisfactory.
Nonetheless, policies often have a regional focus. Many people involved in biological conservation are shifting their attention from a species-oriented to an ecosystem-oriented approach, A catalogue of the world's canids, arranged alphabetically, would be cumbersome, and would necessitates morass of cross references. Therefore, in what we hope is a sensible and utilitarian compromise between the realities of canid biology, the limitations of the data, and the necessity for a geographical framework, we have organized the first part of the Canid Action Plan by geographic regions. The regions we have devised reflect, in broad terms, the biogeographical distribution of Canidae. In some cases, following the lead of the canids, we have crossed continental boundaries. North Africa has been paired with the Middle East, Europe with North America.
Each of the world's canid species has been assigned to one of the following five chapters. The arrangement of species sections within chapters follows a regional approach:
Chapter 4. Sub-Saharan Africa: African wild dog; bat-eared fox;
black-backed jackal; Cape fox; golden jackal; side-striped jackal; Simien
jackal.
Chapter 5. South America: Azara's zorro; bush dog;
crab-eating zorro; culpeo; grey zorro; hoary zorro; maned wolf; Sechuran
zorro; small-cared zorro.
Chapter 6. Holarctic: Arctic fox; coyote; grey fox; grey
wolf; island grey fox; raccoon dog; red fox; red wolf; swift or kit fox.
Chapter 7. North Africa and the Middle East: Blanford's fox;
fennec; pale fox; Rüppell's fox.
Chapter 8. South and Southeast Asia and Australasia: Bengal
fox; corsac fox; dhole; Tibetan fox; dingo.
An area as large and heterogeneous as "Eurasia and North America" may seem excessive for a single chapter. We are not oblivious to the potential absurdity of a single section which embraces almost all of the Northern Hemisphere. However, only 11 species are found therein, and, of that 11, the distributions of three of the species (the red fox, the grey wolf, and the grey fox) exceed even the arbitrary boundaries we have set. Similarly, the range of the golden jackal includes much of north Africa, the Middle East, south and east Asia, and part of Europe. However, most of our information on this species comes from sub-Saharan Africa, so it seemed appropriate to locate the species account in Chapter 4. The structure of each geographically organized chapter is explained in Chapter 3, "Introduction to Geographic Chapters and Species Summaries."
Foxes, wolves, and jackals have much in common-both in their biology, and in their relationships with man. Hence, following the geographical chapters, we have written four chapters on topics almost universally germane to the Canidae as a whole. The topics are trade, captive breeding, predation on stock and game, and disease.
Perhaps the most frequent contact between many urban dwellers and wild canids is when the latter are encountered in the form of a fur coat. Clearly the fur trade is a conspicuous aspect of canid management, and a though an exhaustive analysis of that trade is overdue, and much needed, it would be too large an undertaking for this book. Rather, we have focused here on the immediate impact of the trade in endangered and threatened species. Chapter 10 presents an analysis of the trade in canid species listed under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). We summarize the absolute levels of trade recorded from 1980-1986, and discuss the patterns of trade and use of canids in commerce.
For many endangered species, captive breeding and subsequent reintroduction may offer a final, albeit expensive and circuitous, form of redemption. Exterminated in the wild, the red wolf (Canis rufus) has recently been bred in captivity and reintroduced in North Carolina (Phillips and Parker 1988). Similarly, kit foxes, extirpated from the northern end of their range are now being reintroduced to Canada (Carbyn pers. comm.).
A successful captive breeding programme is often a prerequisite for reintroduction. So, in Chapter 10, we analyze data from the International Zoo Yearbooks (1963-1984) to discover the current level of effort directed at breeding canids in captivity, and the success of these endeavours.
The very opportunism and mobility that is the hallmark of success for many members of the dog family is also responsible for throwing them into conflict with people. This conflict leads us to consider two further topics: first, competition between man and canids through depredations on game and domestic stock; and second, canids as victims of, and often vectors for, several zoonoses, of which rabies is undeniably the most notable. In addition to rabies, there are several other pathogens of direct (e.g. leishmaniasis) and indirect (e.g. sarcoptic mange) concern to man, the latter threatening the far trade, the former threatening life.
The traditional response to perceived problems of predation and disease has been to attempt to reduce canid numbers by killing them. This time-honoured approach has two notable drawbacks: it tends to throw different factions into conflict (e.g. fur traders object to their commodity being blasted by irate shotgun-toting stockmen, and those concerned with animal welfare object to both groups killing canids); and it may not work (either because the problem was merely perceived but not real, or because the solution was inappropriate).
The issues raised by predation and disease are biologically and economically complicated. We have tried, in Chapters 12 and 13, to expose the salient arguments. In Chapter 12, we consider aspects of predation by wild canids on livestock and game. Although many canid species are widely held to have a significant economic impact on the numbers of valuable herbivores, dispassionate analyses of these accusations are few. Because data are often scanty and unevenly spread between species, our review is biased towards those few canids for which more information is available. Our intention is to identify problems common to many canids, real and imaginary, to seek some indication of their magnitudes, and to evaluate the effectiveness of existing solutions and the practicability of novel ones, all from the point of view of species conservation.
In Chapter 13 we discuss disease amongst canids, and its implications for their conservation and for public health. Disease poses both direct and indirect threats to populations of wild canids. In the case of direct threats, the burden of our argument is that disease can decimate small populations of canids (and other animals) irrespective of any security they might apparently be guaranteed by being protected in reserves and parks. We present this argument by assessing the prevalence of disease in various canid populations, along with evidence that disease operates as a population regulation mechanism in canids and, hence, has the potential to wipe out "viable" populations.
Disease is also an indirect threat to the conservation of canids. Many canids may act as vectors for pathogens that pose a threat to humans (or their livestock and pets). Hence, canids are frequently killed in attempts to control zoonoses. Our arguments are based on a review of the evidence that diseases are harboured in canid populations, consideration of the effects of "control" programmes on canid populations, and the efficacy (and hence, economic/ecological wisdom) of such "control" measures.
The species accounts presented here were compiled by the following process: census forms were sent to people known to be interested in canids; these forms posed questions about the distribution and status of wild canids, and solicited information on the names and addresses of other authorizes whom we should contact; data garnered through this survey and from a review of published literature were combined in a draft entry for each species; each such draft was sent to several reviewers; reviewers were selected, where possible, to span the geographic region covered by the species in question; and corrections made by reviewers were incorporated in the preparation of a final version of each species' entry. The Canid Action Plan could not have been completed without the help of these correspondents, and we have tried to represent their views accurately. Nonetheless, we alone are responsible for any errors that may remain in the text.
Many of our correspondents have emphasized the potential usefulness of a register of those involved with canid research. In response, we have included such a list in Appendix 2. Doubtless we have not searched widely enough in compiling this directory, but if there are embarrassing omissions we can only hope that this will prompt readers to advise us of them so that they may be remedied in future editions.
The structure we have imposed upon this first edition of the Canid Action Plan has suited our purpose, but it has drawbacks. For example, by making our focus regional and global, we have largely ignored aspects of conservation at the level of subspecies or of local populations. In defense of this, we would argue that for the most part, patterns of extinction are regional: a succession of sub-populations disappears, survivors become fragmented, and local extirpations start the slippery slide to extinction. In addition, for many species such as the bush dog or the fennec, data are so inadequate that the available materials swiftly determined the scope of our summary. While we may have struggled to float our ideas at a regional level, they would undoubtedly have sunk at any finer resolution. However, for a minority of species, such as the wolf and the African wild dog, we have presented a summary of information for each subpopulation, made a stab at assigning priorities among the subpopulations, and directed readers to publications that cover these species in greater detail.
The nomination of priorities also lures us into an imponderable mirage dividing biology and ethics. It may be tempting to seek criteria on which to decide whether it is more important to save the Simien jackal than the red wolf. But both are irreplaceable. We might be able to guess the order in which endangered canid species will go extinct, but we have tried not to place relative value on the loss of one versus another. Nonetheless, as funds and time are limited, we have tried to focus our action planning on those species most threatened with imminent extinction.
Finally, we are mindful that this is the first edition of the Canid Action Plan. We see its publication as a starting point, a job begun rather than one completed. We hope that it will stimulate a steady stream of information to the Canid Specialist Group, and that this information will lead to a subsequent edition in which our lens can focus at a finer level of resolution. Ideally, a future edition will treat every species at the level that has been possible here only for the wolf and wild dog. In the meantime, while we should plan for the worst, we can hope for the best. Perhaps the gaps in our information house the reservoirs of elusive species; perhaps the fennec fox is abundant somewhere in north Africa, the dhole in Burma, the wild dogs in Ethiopia. Let us hope so, indeed, let us try hard to find out, but let us not bank upon it.
© 1990 International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources