Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan
Scats are often used to study ecological parameters of carnivore species. However, field identification of carnivore scats, based on their morphological characteristics, becomes difficult if many carnivore species are distributed in the same area. We assessed error rates in morphological identificat...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:6052849 2023-05-15T15:50:56+02:00 Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan Akrim, Faraz Mahmood, Tariq Max, Tamara Nadeem, Muhammad Sajid Qasim, Siddiqa Andleeb, Shaista 2018-07-16 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6052849/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30038872 https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5262 en eng PeerJ Inc. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6052849/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30038872 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5262 © 2018 Akrim et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited. CC-BY Conservation Biology Text 2018 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5262 2018-07-29T00:22:38Z Scats are often used to study ecological parameters of carnivore species. However, field identification of carnivore scats, based on their morphological characteristics, becomes difficult if many carnivore species are distributed in the same area. We assessed error rates in morphological identification of five sympatric carnivores’ scats in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan during 2013–2017. A sample of 149 scats were subjected to molecular identification using fecal DNA. We used a confusion matrix to assess different types of errors associated with carnivore scat identification. We were able to amplify DNA from 96.6% (n = 144) of scats. Based on field identification of carnivore scats, we had predicted that out of 144 scats: 11 (7.6%) scats were from common leopard, 38 (26.4%) from red fox, 29 (20.1%) from Asiatic jackal, 37 (25.7%) from yellow throated martin, 14 (9.7%) from Asian palm civet and 15 (10.4%) from small Indian civet. However, molecular identification revealed and confirmed nine were scats (6.24%) from common leopard, 40 (27.8 %) from red fox, 21 (14.6%) from Asiatic jackal, 45 (31.25%) from Asian palm civet, 12 (8.3%) scats from small Indian civet, while 11 scats (7.6%) were found from Canis lupus Spp., three (2%) from dog, one (0.7 %) scat sample from porcupine, and two (1.4%) from rhesus monkey. Misidentification rate was highest for Asian palm civet (25.7%), followed by red fox (11.1%) and Asiatic jackal (9.7%) but least for common leopard scats (4.2%). The results specific to our study area concur with previous studies that have recommended that carnivore monitoring programs utilize molecular identification of predator scats. Using only morphological identification of scats can be misleading and may result in wrong management decisions. Text Canis lupus PubMed Central (PMC) Indian PeerJ 6 e5262 |
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English |
topic |
Conservation Biology |
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Conservation Biology Akrim, Faraz Mahmood, Tariq Max, Tamara Nadeem, Muhammad Sajid Qasim, Siddiqa Andleeb, Shaista Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan |
topic_facet |
Conservation Biology |
description |
Scats are often used to study ecological parameters of carnivore species. However, field identification of carnivore scats, based on their morphological characteristics, becomes difficult if many carnivore species are distributed in the same area. We assessed error rates in morphological identification of five sympatric carnivores’ scats in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan during 2013–2017. A sample of 149 scats were subjected to molecular identification using fecal DNA. We used a confusion matrix to assess different types of errors associated with carnivore scat identification. We were able to amplify DNA from 96.6% (n = 144) of scats. Based on field identification of carnivore scats, we had predicted that out of 144 scats: 11 (7.6%) scats were from common leopard, 38 (26.4%) from red fox, 29 (20.1%) from Asiatic jackal, 37 (25.7%) from yellow throated martin, 14 (9.7%) from Asian palm civet and 15 (10.4%) from small Indian civet. However, molecular identification revealed and confirmed nine were scats (6.24%) from common leopard, 40 (27.8 %) from red fox, 21 (14.6%) from Asiatic jackal, 45 (31.25%) from Asian palm civet, 12 (8.3%) scats from small Indian civet, while 11 scats (7.6%) were found from Canis lupus Spp., three (2%) from dog, one (0.7 %) scat sample from porcupine, and two (1.4%) from rhesus monkey. Misidentification rate was highest for Asian palm civet (25.7%), followed by red fox (11.1%) and Asiatic jackal (9.7%) but least for common leopard scats (4.2%). The results specific to our study area concur with previous studies that have recommended that carnivore monitoring programs utilize molecular identification of predator scats. Using only morphological identification of scats can be misleading and may result in wrong management decisions. |
format |
Text |
author |
Akrim, Faraz Mahmood, Tariq Max, Tamara Nadeem, Muhammad Sajid Qasim, Siddiqa Andleeb, Shaista |
author_facet |
Akrim, Faraz Mahmood, Tariq Max, Tamara Nadeem, Muhammad Sajid Qasim, Siddiqa Andleeb, Shaista |
author_sort |
Akrim, Faraz |
title |
Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan |
title_short |
Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan |
title_full |
Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan |
title_fullStr |
Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan |
title_full_unstemmed |
Assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern Himalayan region of Pakistan |
title_sort |
assessment of bias in morphological identification of carnivore scats confirmed with molecular scatology in north-eastern himalayan region of pakistan |
publisher |
PeerJ Inc. |
publishDate |
2018 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6052849/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30038872 https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5262 |
geographic |
Indian |
geographic_facet |
Indian |
genre |
Canis lupus |
genre_facet |
Canis lupus |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6052849/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30038872 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5262 |
op_rights |
© 2018 Akrim et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5262 |
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PeerJ |
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6 |
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e5262 |
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1766385978592722944 |