In eastern Nepal, local communities are leading the effort to monitor the elusive and endangered red panda, contributor Deepak Adhikari reports for Mongabay.
Fewer than 10,000 red pandas (Ailurus fulgens) now remain in the rapidly disappearing bamboo forests of the eastern Himalayas across India, Bhutan, China and Nepal.
To help monitor them in Nepal, the nonprofit Red Panda Network (RPN) launched a Forest Guardian program in 2010 with local community guardians. These guardians help count red pandas, track their behavior and habitat use, raise awareness about the animals in their communities, and mobilize support against poaching.
“Our biggest challenge is building trust with local communities. The Forest Guardians serve as our local ambassadors,” Ang Phuri Sherpa, the organization’s executive director, told Mongabay.
The program started with just 16 forest guardians in Nepal; it has now recruited about 128, mostly from underprivileged and economically marginalized groups from local communities. Of these, 44 guardians monitor red pandas within the Panchthar–Ilam–Taplejung Corridor, a 11,500-square-kilometer (4,440-square-mile) habitat that’s home to about a quarter of Nepal’s red panda population.
The guardians surveil the corridor four times a year, in February, May, August and November, which mark key periods in the red panda’s life cycle, like the breeding and mating seasons.
These sightings, together with GPS mapping, camera trap footage and patrol logs from all seasons, are regularly compiled to guide conservation strategies. “These efforts have helped identify key habitat zones, guide antipoaching measures and inform local land-use planning,” Sherpa said.
Arjun Thapa, a wildlife researcher at the Beijing-based Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Zoology, who wasn’t involved in the program, cautioned the data collected by the guardians must be rigorously validated and analyzed. “Without that, it’s difficult to make evidence-based decisions or meaningful management interventions.”
Still, the forest guardian model focuses on where red pandas are most at risk. About 70% of red panda habitat in Nepal lies outside protected areas and is vulnerable to encroachment, while the species is at risk of being poached. Community patrolling seems to be helping. “Earlier, there were up to 10 poaching incidents a year,” Sherpa said. “In the last five or six years, we haven’t had a single case in our project areas.”
RPN also trains the communities to run homestays and guided nature tours, and supports other income-generating programs like rug weaving and crochet making. “Our goal is to reduce dependence on forests by providing alternative livelihoods,” Sherpa said.
The awareness drive appears to be paying off: In a 2021 study, Sherpa and his colleagues reported that people in the Panchthar–Ilam–Taplejung corridor were more aware of red panda conservation than people in western and central Nepal.
Despite community participation in red panda conservation, threats remain, including attacks by feral dogs and road construction through critical red panda habitats.
Read the full story by Deepak Adhikari here.
Banner image: Forest guardian Surya Bhattarai. Image courtesy of Red Panda Network.
