Community attitudes towards Amur tigers (Panthera tigris altaica) and their prey species in Yanbian, Jilin province, a region of northeast China where tigers are returning

PLoS One. 2022 Oct 27;17(10):e0276554. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0276554. eCollection 2022.

Abstract

Community attitudes towards large carnivores are of central importance to their conservation in human-dominated landscapes. In this study, we evaluate community attitudes and perceptions towards the Amur tiger (Panthera tigris altaica), Amur leopard (Panthera pardus orientalis) and bears (Ursus thibetanus and Ursus arctos), as well as their prey species, namely sika deer (Cervus nippon), roe deer and wild boar (Sus scrofa), in Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, Jilin province, northeast China. We surveyed 139 households and found that community members' perceptions of large carnivores and their prey species were influenced by their predominant economic activities; their prior interactions with wildlife; their household income level; and whether they were either long-term residents of Yanbian or had migrated to the region from elsewhere in China. We recorded fairly neutral attitudes towards large carnivores among the communities we surveyed, but strongly negative attitudes were shown towards wild boar, particularly where respondents had lost agricultural products to crop raiding by wild boar. We recommend conservation stakeholders in northeast China utilise this finding to encourage support for large carnivore recovery and conservation by targeting messaging around the importance of the tiger as a key predator of wild boar in the ecosystem. Furthermore, our findings suggest that government provided compensation paid for cattle lost to large carnivore predation (notably, by tigers) may be helping to reduce animosity from cattle owners towards large carnivores. However, we also highlight that compensation for loss of livestock is therefore performing a useful role in mitigating human-wildlife conflict, that there are potentially unintended consequences of the current compensation program, for example it fails to dissuade livestock grazing in protected areas.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Animals, Wild
  • Attitude
  • Cattle
  • China
  • Conservation of Natural Resources
  • Deer*
  • Ecosystem
  • Humans
  • Panthera*
  • Sus scrofa
  • Swine
  • Tigers*
  • Ursidae*

Grants and funding

Ying Li was supported by grants from the Conservation Leadership Programme (Grant Number 03292116), Tiger & Leopard Conservation Fund in Korea (KTLCF) Tumen River ecology network project, 2015-2020, and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Number 41830643). Joshua Powell was funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (Grant Number NE/S007229/1) and was supported by Research England. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.