by
Andrés Novaro*
The impact of hunting on many canids is a perplexing
unknown.
In Argentina a new project seeks to quantify this for the culpeo.
Wildlife trade is an important component of Argentina's economy. Legal exports of wildlife products can reach US $100 million per annum (Ojeda and Mares, 1982; Cajal, 1986) with up to $200 million being made in the illegal market (Clarin, 1990).
Wildlife hunting is an important source of income for people in rural Argentina. In Patagonia, more than 100,000 foxes (culpeos, Dusicyon culpaeus, and grey foxes, Dusicyon griseus) are hunted for their fur annually (Rabinovich et al., 1987). At approximately $10 for each fox skin in Patagonia, this represents more than $1 million per annum income to local people in the region. Each ranch worker that hunts usually captures 10-20 foxes per annum, which represents 50-100% of a monthly salary.
Despite this commercial significance, there is scant information on the status of Argentina's hunted species, or on the impact of hunting on their populations; the foxes are no exception. For the culpeo fox the impact of commercial hunting is added to that of predator-control programmes (Bellati and Von Thungen, 1987). Culpeos prey on sheep, and in many areas of Patagonia, particularly in Chubut and Santa Cruz Provinces, they are killed with poison which also damages non-target species.
Decisions about management of Carnivores in Argentina are based, at best, on evaluations of the changes in the numbers harvested or exported in recent years. These numbers depend on both population sizes and hunting pressure, which are variable and difficult to assess.
Harvesting Trends
Figure 1 [coming soon!] shows the annual legal exports of Culpeo pelts from Argentina between 1976-1990 (data from Fujita and Calvo (1982), Gruss and Waller (1988), CITES Secretariat, and Direción Nacional de Fauna Silvestre, in García Fernandez (1992)). Annual figures ranged from 8,524 pelts in 1977 to 138 in 1985, with a marked decline in exports during the 1980s which was paralleled for the grey foxes (García Fernandez, 1992). This decline might represent decreasing population numbers, decreasing international demand, or the high black market value of foreign exchange during the early 1980s, which encouraged illegal exportation of wildlife. Unfortunately there are no data on domestic use of fox pelts, although it appears to be significant in the case of the culpeo (García Fernandez, 1992).
For the culpeo harvest, only fragmentary information is available. In Neuquén Province, in northwest Patagonia, culpeo harvests parallel its export nationally (Figure 2). A marked decline during the late 70s was interpreted by the provincial administration as a decline in population. Hunting of culpeos was banned in Neuquén during 1981 and 1982, but since the ban was lifted in 1983 the legal harvest has not recovered.
The decline during the 1980?s in culpeo harvest records in Neuquén probably results from a decrease in hunting-law enforcement. The total number of inspection visits to fur warehouses dropped from 382 in 1983 to 34 in 1987, and the number of violations detected dropped from 60 to 6 during the same years (Figure 2). The level of inspection visits was positively correlated with the culpeo legal harvest between 1983 and 1987 (r2 = 0.834; n = 5). As enforcement declined, fewer local fur buyers requested permits or declared the numbers of pelts traded, thus avoiding taxation. This decline in law enforcement arose from an economic crisis that led to reductions in personnel and availability of vehicles and gasoline to patrol roads. Wildlife administrators in Neuquén agree in that the decline of the legal culpeo harvest, excluding that between 1979-80, merely represents an increase of illegal activities (A. del Valle, pers. comm.).
In 1989 I began monitoring densities of culpeos and other furbearers in southern C, in collaboration with the local wildlife agency (Novaro and Funes, in preparation). In the area sampled, culpeos are intensively harvested, both for their fur and to reduce sheep mortality. Between 20-50 culpeos are killed on each ranch annually. Six ranches (totalling c.1,000 km2) were sampled each winter using scent-stations (Roughton and Sweeny, 1982). Despite the hunting pressure and the decline in their main prey, the hare (Lepus capensis), culpeo densities were stable during the last three years (Figure 3).
However, in Rio Negro Province, northern Patagonia, densities of culpeos have declined slightly (Von Thunghen and Bellati, 1987; J. Von Thungen, pers. comm., 1991). In 1992 we initiated a monitoring programme of furbearer densities throughout Patagonia. This involves the continuation of the surveys in Neuquén and western Rio Negro and the sampling of six new areas in La Pampa, eastern Rio Negro, Chubut, Santa Cruz, and Tierra del Fuego Provinces and the Nahuel Huapi National Park on the foothills of the Andes. Technical personnel from each provincial wildlife agency undertake these surveys, where scent stations are operated at the beginning of the hunting season and the numbers of culpeos and other furbearers hunted in the area are recorded.
Some other provinces in Patagonia have begun to monitor the harvest levels of foxes more efficiently, while helping local hunters increase their share in the fur trade. For instance, in 1988 the Rio Negro wildlife agency initiated a trading system in which furs are collected by local agricultural cooperatives. The wildlife agency then organizes an auction at which representatives of tanneries and exporters buy the furs directly, avoiding the many intermediaries that usually retain the majority of the benefits. Local hunters have thereby increased their benefits between three and eight fold, and the wildlife agencies are securing a more accurate estimate of hunting levels in the province. However, wildlife officials still believe that this system has absorbed only about 10% of the real fur market in the province (M. Alcalde, pers. comm., 1992). Through this system 7,973 pelts of D. griseus and 688 of culpeos were reported in 1988, 8,340 and 1,489 in 1989, 2,441 and 321 in 1990, and 621 and 170 in 1991 (Subsecretaría de Fauna, 1988, 1989, 1990, and 1991). According to M. Alcalde, the Rio Negro wildlife director, the decline in numbers has been the result of a decreasing demand and a continuous decline in the fur prices paid by wildlife traders.
In spite of the unknown but high current levels of hunting and predator control activities throughout continental Patagonia, both our data and that of wildlife managers indicate that culpeo densities have not experienced marked changes during the last few years. However, there is no information on the impact of hunting on the population structure, survival, and long term persistence of the species (Novaro, 1991).
On the other hand, culpeo populations are declining in Tierra del Fuego Province, despite the ban that has been in effect since 1985 (Fabbro and Loekemeyer, pers. comm., 1992). This decline could be the result of illegal hunting, which the reduced personnel of the local wildlife agency finds difficult to control.
In summary, harvesting of culpeos in some areas of Patagonia could be sustainable, but more information and improved control measures are needed. These will allow management agencies to develop plans for the sustainable use and the conservation of culpeos and other furbearing species in Argentina. I therefore conclude:
Bellati, J. & Von Thungen, J. 1987. Impacto de depredadores en corderos de hasta 60 dias de edad en el Oeste de la Provincia de Rio Negro. Abstracts of the XIII Reunion Argentina de Ecologia, Bahia Blanca, 1987.
Cajal, J. L. 1986. El recurso fauna en la Argentina. Secretaria de Ciencia y Tecnica, Buenos Aires, Argentina, 39 pp.
Clarin, 1990. Los traficantes de la fauna silvestre. Clarin Newspaper, December 2, 1990, p. 10.
Fujita, H. & Calvo, J. 1982. Las exportaciones de productos y subproductos de la fauna silvestre en el quinquenio 1976-1980. IDIA 397/400: 1-2.
García Fernandez, J. J. 1992. Administrando para conservar: el caso de los zorros autoctonos de la Argentina. In: Actas de la Tercera Reunión Patagónica de Manejo de Zorros, J. de los Andes. Eds. M. C. Funes & A. J. Novaro. In press.
G:russ, J. and Waller, T. 1988. Diagnóstico y recomendaciones sobre la administración de recursos silvestres en Argentina: la década reciente. Traffic Sudamérica, 113 pp.
Novaro, A. J. 1991. Feeding ecology and abundance of a harvested population of culpeo fox (Dusicyon culpaeus) in Patagonia. M.S. Thesis, University of Florida, Gainesville, 103 pp.
Novaro, A. J. & Funes, M. C. Furbearer population trends and impact of hunting in Neuquén, Argentina. Manuscript in preparation.
Ojeda, R. A. & Mares, M. A. 1982. Conservation of South American Mammals: Argentina as a paradigm. Pp. 505-21 in Mammalian biology in South America. Ed. M. A. Mares and H. H. Genoways. Pymatuning Symp. Ecol., vol. 6, Pittsburgh, PA, Univ. of Pittsburgh.
Rabinovich, J., Capurro, A., Folgarait, P., Kitzberger, T., Kramer, G., Novaro, A. J., Puppo, M. & Travaini, A. 1987. Estado del conocimiento de 12 especies de la fauna silvestre argentina de valor comercial. Report to the Second Argentinean Workshop on Wildlife of Commercial Value, Buenos Aires, 154 pp.
Roughton, R. D. & Sweeny, M. W. 1982. Refinements in scent-station methodology for assessing trends in carnivore populations. J. Wildl. Manage., 46: 217-229.
Subsecretaría de Fauna. 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991. Sistema provincial de acopio de pieles finas. Report to Ministerio de Recursos Naturales, Provincia de Rio Negro, Viedma.
Von Thungen, J. & Bellati, J. 1987. Determinacion de un índice de densidad poblacional de zorros en el N.O de la Patagonia. Resumenes XIII Reunión Argentina de Ecología, Bahía Blanca, abril 1987.
* Andrés Novaro, having completed a Masters on the culpeo, is now undertaking a doctorate through the University of Florida on the ecology and conservation of this species. Since 1989 he has been the prime mover in surveying the impact of hunters on this species.
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