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The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia

Logging and forest conversion to oil palm plantations in Southeast Asia have resulted in the formations of numerous small isolated forest fragments scattered within or surrounding converted habitat landscapes. Although large areas have been affected, little is known about their impacts on the native...

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Main Author: Tung, Siaw Ean
Format: Thesis
Language:English
English
Published: 2020
Subjects:
QL700-739.8 Mammals
Online Access:https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/1/24%20PAGES.pdf
https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/2/FULLTEXT.pdf
https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/
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spelling my.ums.eprints.420562024-12-16T02:45:39Z https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/ The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia Tung, Siaw Ean QL700-739.8 Mammals Logging and forest conversion to oil palm plantations in Southeast Asia have resulted in the formations of numerous small isolated forest fragments scattered within or surrounding converted habitat landscapes. Although large areas have been affected, little is known about their impacts on the native small mammal fauna. By using standardised grid trapping techniques and Generalised Linear Mixed-Effects modelling (GLMM), the species richness, abundance and diversity of the small mammals at ten forest fragment sites i.e. five in selectively logged forest fragments (12-88 ha) and five in unlogged forest fragments (45-3529 ha), were compared with four continuous forest sites i.e. two in continuous selectively logged forest and two in continuous unlogged primary forest (>800000 ha) in the lowland areas in eastern Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. The objectives were to assess the effects of logging and forest fragmentation on aspects of community structure of the small mammals. Additionally, the effects of fragment size, degree of isolation as well as aspects of forest quality were also investigated. Non-matrix Multidimensional Scaling (NMDS) plot was used to discern the small mammal assemblage composition by forest type treatments. In general, unlogged forests had significantly higher small mammal species richness and diversity compared to that of logged forests. Irrespective of the forest conditions, significantly fewer species but higher abundance of small mammals were recorded in forest fragments compared to continuous forests. In terms of species composition, forest fragments (both logged and unlogged) were dominated by common and widespread species, whereas rare species were more represented in the continuous forest sites. The effects of forest isolation and forest quality on the small mammals’ community were not significant. Overall, the present study revealed the negative effects of logging and forest fragmentation on the small mammal community. However, forest fragments are still valuable for conserving many common native species of small mammals that are adapted to living in disturbed forest. Given that converted habitats, such as oil palm plantations, and other disturbed landscapes are generally species poor in terms of the native small mammal fauna, retaining forest fragments within or surrounding converted habitat landscapes may mitigate the loss of local biodiversity resources to some extent. 2020 Thesis NonPeerReviewed text en https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/1/24%20PAGES.pdf text en https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/2/FULLTEXT.pdf Tung, Siaw Ean (2020) The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia. Masters thesis, Universiti Malaysia Sabah.
institution Universiti Malaysia Sabah
building UMS Library
collection Institutional Repository
continent Asia
country Malaysia
content_provider Universiti Malaysia Sabah
content_source UMS Institutional Repository
url_provider http://eprints.ums.edu.my/
language English
English
topic QL700-739.8 Mammals
spellingShingle QL700-739.8 Mammals
Tung, Siaw Ean
The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia
description Logging and forest conversion to oil palm plantations in Southeast Asia have resulted in the formations of numerous small isolated forest fragments scattered within or surrounding converted habitat landscapes. Although large areas have been affected, little is known about their impacts on the native small mammal fauna. By using standardised grid trapping techniques and Generalised Linear Mixed-Effects modelling (GLMM), the species richness, abundance and diversity of the small mammals at ten forest fragment sites i.e. five in selectively logged forest fragments (12-88 ha) and five in unlogged forest fragments (45-3529 ha), were compared with four continuous forest sites i.e. two in continuous selectively logged forest and two in continuous unlogged primary forest (>800000 ha) in the lowland areas in eastern Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. The objectives were to assess the effects of logging and forest fragmentation on aspects of community structure of the small mammals. Additionally, the effects of fragment size, degree of isolation as well as aspects of forest quality were also investigated. Non-matrix Multidimensional Scaling (NMDS) plot was used to discern the small mammal assemblage composition by forest type treatments. In general, unlogged forests had significantly higher small mammal species richness and diversity compared to that of logged forests. Irrespective of the forest conditions, significantly fewer species but higher abundance of small mammals were recorded in forest fragments compared to continuous forests. In terms of species composition, forest fragments (both logged and unlogged) were dominated by common and widespread species, whereas rare species were more represented in the continuous forest sites. The effects of forest isolation and forest quality on the small mammals’ community were not significant. Overall, the present study revealed the negative effects of logging and forest fragmentation on the small mammal community. However, forest fragments are still valuable for conserving many common native species of small mammals that are adapted to living in disturbed forest. Given that converted habitats, such as oil palm plantations, and other disturbed landscapes are generally species poor in terms of the native small mammal fauna, retaining forest fragments within or surrounding converted habitat landscapes may mitigate the loss of local biodiversity resources to some extent.
format Thesis
author Tung, Siaw Ean
author_facet Tung, Siaw Ean
author_sort Tung, Siaw Ean
title The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia
title_short The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia
title_full The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia
title_fullStr The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia
title_full_unstemmed The value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in Sabah, Malaysia
title_sort value of forest fragments within or surrounding oil palm plantations and disturbed landscapes for terrestrial mammal conservation in sabah, malaysia
publishDate 2020
url https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/1/24%20PAGES.pdf
https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/2/FULLTEXT.pdf
https://eprints.ums.edu.my/id/eprint/42056/
_version_ 1818835178119757824
score 13.223943

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