雄性猎豹在“猫吧”留言。 了解这些地方有助于拯救物种
当农民将牛群从猎豹通讯中心移走时，他们失去的小牛减少了

     2020 年 12 月 7 日 作者：Virginia Morell

新的研究表明，非洲的特定树木和大石头就像雄性猎豹的酒吧。大型猫科动物利用这些地方寻找配偶并向其他雄性发送信号，有效地使它们成为其物种的交流中心。研究表明，它们也可能是从愤怒的农民手中拯救动物的关键。

“向他们致敬！”布里斯托大学的行为生态学家蒂姆·卡罗 (Tim Caro) 谈到了研究人员的工作。他指出，这项研究表明，在做出保护管理决策之前了解野生动物的行为非常重要。

Caro 的早期研究是猎豹研究的起点。在 1980 年代，他发现大型猫科动物在哺乳动物中拥有独特的社会系统：独居的雌性猫科动物分布在巨大的区域内，包括雄性猫科动物拥有的较小领土。雄性之间争夺领地的竞争非常激烈，它们经常与一两个不相关的雄性结成联盟来保卫自己的土地。没有领地的雄性（称为漂浮物）四处游荡，希望接管这些财产之一。

卡罗还指出，雄性猫有不同的位置，通常是树或大石头，它们经常用气味标记。在这项新研究中，由莱布尼茨动物园和野生动物研究所空间生态学家 Joerg Melzheimer 领导的科学家们意识到，这些地方正在发生一些重要的事情。

2007 年至 2018 年期间，Melzheimer 及其同事为生活在纳米比亚中部近 11,000 平方公里牧场的 106 只成年猎豹安装了无线电项圈。研究小组发现，领地雄性有一半的时间在这些树木或岩石上，经常用尿液标记它们。与此同时，漂浮物定期访问这些网站，但只是停下来闻一闻。雌性偶尔也会检查，在发情时留下痕迹。梅尔茨海默说，每个这样的地点通常都位于雄性领地的中心，其功能“就像一个受欢迎的酒吧，在那里你可能有更好的机会找到交配对象”。

随着时间的推移，这些中心是稳定的。即使当新的雄性接管一个领地时，它们也会使用与前任主人相同的气味标记位置。
猎豹连续领土持有者的数字地图，带有指示通信枢纽的图标

一只猎豹通讯枢纽的地图。在 A 中，从黑色到黄色到蓝色到红色的连续彩色圆点可以看出，男性领地持有者随着时间的推移发生了变化。在 B 中，绿色星星代表通信枢纽周围的猎豹标记位置。Melzheimer 等人。

从保护的角度来看，这可能很重要。和大多数大型猫科动物一样，猎豹也面临着危险的未来。栖息地丧失、猎物减少以及与人的冲突使它们的数量从 1975 年的 14,000 只减少到今天的约 7000 只。大多数现在在东部和南部非洲保护区以外的农田上发现；亚洲猎豹几乎灭绝。

虽然猎豹不是牲畜的主要杀手，但它们会猎杀幼崽，特别是当它们找不到自己的野生猎物——羚羊、瞪羚、黑斑羚和疣猪时。在纳米比亚和其他地方，农民会先发制人地杀死猎豹，或者为了报复攻击他们的牲畜或猎物。这种与农场有关的杀戮被认为是对猎豹的主要威胁。

Melzheimer 的团队与 35 名因猎豹而失去牲畜的农民合作。其中，有六个在他们的土地上有一个猎豹通信中心，并且有充分记录的猎豹攻击。 Melzheimer 认为猎豹在这些地点收集的信息非常重要，如果农民将动物转移到其他地方，猫就不会跟随牲畜。尽管六位农民持怀疑态度，但他们同意将带乳牛的牛群转移到远离这些中心的地区。研究小组今天在《美国国家科学院院刊》上报告说，随后被猎豹捕食的小牛数量平均减少了 86%。

伊利诺伊大学厄巴纳-香槟分校的食肉动物生态学家马克西米利安艾伦说，这是一个“惊人的”下降，他没有参与这项研究。 “似乎这些发现可以应用于猎豹与农业和畜牧业重叠的任何领域。”

梅尔茨海默同意。 “我们发现不存在‘问题动物’，”他说，而是“‘问题区域’。”他补充说，“[在纳米比亚这一地区]拥有通信中心的每个农民现在都在实施我们的建议， "而且该国还有更多的农民正在参与这项研究。

其他猫有不同的社会结构和中心，所以这项研究不会直接帮助它们。但这项工作确实提出了一种思考人类与野生动物冲突的新方法——这是“绝对值得探索的东西”，艾伦说。

*更正，12 月 8 日，上午 10:15：本文已更改，以反映所有猫科动物，无论是野生的还是家养的，都会标记其领土；不过，它们的做法与猎豹不同。

Farmers lost fewer calves when they moved herds away from cheetah communication hubs

Specific trees and large rocks in Africa are like bars for male cheetahs, new research reveals. The big cats use these places to find mates and send signals to other males, effectively making them communication hubs for their species. They may also be key to saving the animals from angry farmers, the study suggests.

"Hats off to them!" Tim Caro, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Bristol, says of the researchers' work. The study shows the importance of understanding the behavior of wild animals before making conservation management decisions, he notes.

Caro's earlier research served as a starting point for the cheetah study. In the 1980s, he discovered that the big cats have a unique social system among mammals: Solitary females range over huge areas that encompass the smaller territories held by males. Competition among males for their domains is fierce, and they often form coalitions with one or two unrelated males to defend their land. Males without territories (called floaters) roam around looking to take over one of these holdings.

Caro also noted that the male cats had distinct locations, typically a tree or large rock, they regularly marked with their scents. In the new study, scientists led by Joerg Melzheimer, a spatial ecologist at the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, realized something important was afoot at these locales.

Between 2007 and 2018, Melzheimer and colleagues attached radio collars to 106 adult cheetahs living in central Namibia on nearly 11,000 square kilometers of cattle ranches. Territorial males spent half their time at these trees or rocks, marking them frequently with urine, the team found. Meanwhile, floaters visited the sites regularly, but only stopped by to sniff. Females also occasionally checked in, leaving their mark when in estrus. Each such site was typically found in the center of a male's territory and functioned "like a popular bar, where you might have a Better chance of finding mating partners," Melzheimer says.

These hubs were stable over time. Even when new males took over a territory, they used the same scent-marking location as the previous owners.

That could be important from a conservation standpoint. Like most big cats, cheetahs are facing a perilous future. Habitat loss, dwindling prey, and conflicts with people have halved their numbers from 14,000 in 1975 to about 7000 today. Most are now found in eastern and southern Africa on farmlands outside of protected areas; the Asiatic cheetah is nearly extinct.

Although cheetahs aren't known as major livestock killers, they will hunt young calves, particularly if they can't find their own wild prey—antelope, gazelles, impalas, and warthogs. In Namibia and elsewhere, farmers kill cheetahs either preemptively or in retaliation for attacking their livestock or game animals. Such farm-related killings are considered the main threat to cheetahs.

Melzheimer's team collaborated with 35 farmers who had lost stock to cheetahs. Of these, six had a cheetah communication hub on their land, and well-documented cheetah attacks. Melzheimer thought the information the cheetahs gathered at these sites was so important, the cats would not follow the livestock if farmers moved their animals elsewhere. Although the six farmers were skeptical, they agreed to move their herds with suckling calves to areas away from these hubs. The number of calves subsequently lost to predation by cheetahs decreased by 86% on average, the team reports today in theProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

That's an "astounding" drop, says Maximilian Allen, a carnivore ecologist at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, who was not involved in the study. "It seems these findings can be applied in any areas where cheetahs overlap with agriculture and livestock."

Melzheimer concurs. "We've discovered there aren't ‘problem animals,'" he says, but "‘problem areas.'" He adds that "every farmer [in this part of Namibia] who has a communication hub is now implementing our advice," and that additional farmers in the country are participating in the research.

Other cats have different social structures and hubs, so the study won't directly help them. But the work does suggest a new way to think about human-wildlife conflicts—something "definitely worth exploring," Allen says.

*Correction, 8 December, 10:15 a.m.: This article has been changed to reflect the fact that all felines, wild or domestic, mark their territories; they do so differently, though, from cheetahs.