Musk Deer Moschus Cupreus Persist in the Eastern Forests of Afghanistan

Musk deer Moschus cupreus persist in the eastern forests of Afghanistan

S TEPHANE O STROWSKI,HAQIQ R AHMANI,JAN M OHAMMAD A LI R ITA A LI and P ETER Z AHLER

Abstract Nuristan province, in north-east Afghanistan, Paludan concluded, ‘...the animals I have seen are holds a significant portion of the country’s remaining for- musk deer’. ests, but because of the inaccessible terrain and the recent Since this first documented record of musk deer in history of poor security little is known about the wildlife in- Afghanistan, presumably of the Kashmir musk deer habiting these forests. We conducted transect surveys in Moschus cupreus (Timmins & Duckworth, a), sub- central Nuristan and confirmed the presence of musk deer sequent scientific expeditions have failed to confirm its pres- Moschus cupreus .  years after the last documented ob- ence, raising doubt about the species’ persistence in the servation of the species in Afghanistan. We found that, in country. Naumann & Nogge () were told of an ungulate summer, musk deer inhabit remote alpine scrub on scat- species that inhabited Kamu Valley in eastern Nuristan, tered rock outcrops and in upper fringes of closed conifer- which they identified as musk deer on the basis of responses ous forests at c. ,–, m. They invariably use steep of local hunters who were shown photographs of this species. slopes ($ °), which makes them difficult to approach. Local people also reported the presence of musk deer in We built a data-driven geographical model, which predicted Nisheigram and Maktosho, in central Nuristan, to Petocz & that suitable habitat for musk deer in Afghanistan extends Larsson (), yet these authors neither observed the deer  over c. , km in the contiguous provinces of Nuristan nor found signs of its presence. A biodiversity survey of cen- (.%), Kunar (.%) and Laghman (.%). Although tral Nuristan during – using walked transects, cam- relatively vast, the area of habitat potentially available to era traps and DNA identification of scats could not confirm musk deer in Afghanistan appears to be highly fragmented. the presence of musk deer (Stevens et al., ) even though Despite indications of unsustainable hunting, this Endangered the surveyed area was anticipated as a main stronghold of species persists in Afghanistan and targeted conservation musk deer in Afghanistan (Habibi, ). However, musk programmes are required to protect it and its forest habitat. deer are difficult to study because they are timid, solitary animals and remain hidden in dense, shrubby forest under- Keywords Afghanistan, distribution range, Moschus growth during most of the day (Nowak, ). For this cupreus, musk deer, Nuristan, suitable habitat reason and because of the lack of security to investigate its preferred habitat in Afghanistan, the extent of musk deer distribution in Afghanistan has remained unknown. Introduction The Kashmir musk deer is categorized as Endangered on the IUCN Red List, based on a suspected % population n  May , in Afghanistan’s Parun Valley in the decline across its range (Timmins & Duckworth, a), Oremote eastern province of Kafiristan (now and it is believed to be rare in Afghanistan and threatened Nuristan), Knut Paludan (a member of the Third Danish by over-exploitation (Habibi, ). Deforestation may pose Expedition to Central Asia, –) observed ‘...an a significant threat to the habitat of this forest-dwelling spe- animal about the size of a roe deer, greyish like a roe in cies, and results of a remote-sensing investigation (UNEP, winter, but the hindquarters were not snow white; head ) suggested that Nuristan and the contiguous provinces small, narrow; antler or horn not seen’ (Hassinger, ). of Kunar and Nangarhar lost % of their forests during The deer was identified as a musk deer Moschus sp. after a –. Given the precarious situation of the musk local elder was questioned and shown pictures of mammals deer in Afghanistan it is important to reconfirm its presence from India. After seeing another deer similar to the first, there and estimate the extent of suitable habitat remaining. Here we report on environmental requirements and preferred habitat of the species as observed in central STEPHANE OSTROWSKI (Corresponding author) and PETER ZAHLER Wildlife Conservation Society, 2300 Southern Blvd, Bronx, 10460 NY, USA Nuristan and, considering habitat observations carried out E-mail [email protected] in Pakistan and India on the Kashmir musk deer and on

HAQIQ RAHMANI School of Geography, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK the closely related Himalayan musk deer Moschus leucoga-  JAN MOHAMMAD ALI and RITA ALI Waygal, Nuristan, Afghanistan ster in Nepal (Timmins & Duckworth, b), propose a Received  April . Revision requested  June . geographical model of suitable habitat for musk deer in Accepted  July . First published online  October . Afghanistan.

Oryx, 2016, 50(2), 323–328 © 2014 Fauna & Flora International doi:10.1017/S0030605314000611 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.34.90, on 26 Sep 2021 at 15:06:35, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0030605314000611 324 S. Ostrowski et al.

Methods northern India, and using the WWF WildFinder database (WWF, ), which lists the ecoregions (Olson et al., To evaluate the possible occurrence and range occupancy of ) and species found within them. We linked our survey musk deer in central Nuristan we carried out a wildlife map- results and relevant habitat descriptions from the literature –  ping exercise during April May based on community to Afghanistan’s  land cover types, mapped by the Food interviews across an area known to have potentially appro- and Agriculture Organization (FAO, ) during –  priate habitat (Stevens et al., ). To help identify locations  by photointerpretation of available Landsat Thematic  for field surveys, local residents of villages were asked to Mapper satellite data at -m resolution. The elevation pinpoint on a map areas where musk deer occur at present and slope data gathered from the field were used to refine  and where they occurred years ago. In case participants did the species’ range coverage. Elevation and slope data were not know how to read maps, field teams translated sites and extracted from Shuttle Radar Topography Mission digital regions mentioned to the appropriate areas on the map. elevation models at -m spatial resolution across Using the information collected from this community Afghanistan (CGIAR-CSI, ). Information on human mapping and from interviews with five self-identified hun- settlements was sourced from digitized settlement maps ters in the village of Waygal, a team conducted a survey in made during – (AIMS, ). the Kashtoun mountain chain to the north-west of Waygal. We determined that all suitable habitat for musk deer in –  During June the team surveyed a remote area of Afghanistan lies within three ecoregions: Northwestern   c. km , on foot, focusing on early morning and late evening Himalayan alpine shrub and meadows, Hindu Kush to increase opportunities to encounter musk deer. Eight Alpine meadows, and East Afghan montane conifer forests.  transects were surveyed over a total of c. hours, with sur- Within these ecoregions we selected three types of land veyors recording any evidence of the presence of the species cover as inclusive of all potential habitats for musk deer: (e.g. sightings, faeces, latrines, bedding sites, tracks), and lo- closed forest, open forest (possibly only used in winter cation, elevation and habitat type (closed coniferous forest, when high alpine pastures and subalpine forest become un- mixed coniferous/deciduous forest, rock outcrop with mea- suitable because of heavy snowfall), and high-elevation rock dows, or rangeland). The cliffs in the area made it inaccess- outcrops with alpine meadows. We included elevations of ible to livestock but markhor Capra falconeri may have been ,–, m and slopes > °, and excluded areas within present, and therefore only musk deer sightings, character-  km of human settlements as unfavourable to musk deer. istic latrines, and bedding sites with recognizable hairs were Habitat suitability modelling was carried out at a  ×  included as evidence of presence. Hair fibres were examined m ground resolution using the ModelBuilder tool in using microscopy and compared with reference hairs of ArcGIS v. . (ESRI, Redlands, USA). ModelBuilder is Kashmir musk deer, markhor and livestock, and published used to develop new geoprocessing workflows and custo-  photographic keys (Anwar et al., ). Guard hairs of the mize existing models, using a step-by-step (on-screen) outer coat of musk deer present a characteristic isodiametric approach (Malczewski, ). cuticular scale pattern, a wineglass-shaped root, and a mid- shaft diameter more than double that of any other ungulate hair in the region. As a result of the deteriorating security Results conditions in the east of Afghanistan since early  the results of this survey could not be retrieved from the research For the mapping exercise c.  adult males were interviewed team until late , and hair samples were analysed in . in each village, with  interviews in total. Only limited in- We constructed a geographical model of suitable habitat formation could be inferred from these interviews, given the for musk deer in Afghanistan based on a method described small sample size (, % of the population) and the ques- by Kanderian et al. (), using habitat macrofeatures de- tionable reliability of the participants’ knowledge of musk scribed by satellite imagery, aerial photography and a geo- deer. Only % of responses affirmed the presence of graphical information system. The two main variables musk deer in central Nuristan, supporting the possibility used to describe the habitat were ecoregion and land cover that the species is rare or particularly elusive. Analysis of type; elevation, slope and proximity to human settlements responses according to a remoteness gradient showed that were used as refining variables. To determine the ecological the species was reported significantly more frequently by requirements of musk deer and correlate them with habitat respondents living in remote northern villages (.%, n =  variables we used information derived from our interview respondents) than those in less remote central (.%, n = )  and survey results and from a literature survey (Green, and southern (.%, n = ) villages (χ = .,P, .). ,; Kattel & Alldredge, ; Qureshi et al., ; The distribution of the species is reportedly limited to the Rajchal, ; Qamar et al., ). We identified suitable upper reaches (. , m) of the Kashtoun mountain ecoregions for musk deer in Afghanistan by extrapolating chain, north-east of Nisheegram and Wama villages, steep ecoregional information for musk deer in Pakistan and and remote areas near Kantewa and Pashki villages in the

FIG. 1 Locations where evidence of musk deer Moschus cupreus was recorded in the Kashtoun mountains, in Nuristan province. The shaded square on the inset shows the location of Nuristan province in Afghanistan.

Rhododendron spp. and Ribes spp. at altitudes of ,– , m(Plate ). The team also recorded two bedding sites at the upper edge of coniferous forest, two latrines with recognizable hairs in rock outcrop areas, and a mandible bone with hairs, to the east of the study site, all at > , m(Fig. ). All animals were seen active during early morning (.–.) and were not observed during the rest of the day except for the solitary male observed on one occasion in the evening (.). Few behavioural observations could be made. On four occasions deer were observed standing still, obviously aware of human presence, and only on one occasion the solitary male was seen feeding on forbs in a meadow. The team also found evidence of browsing on new shoots of conifer branches at the edge of

PLATE 1 Summer habitat of musk deer Moschus cupreus in the tree line. The musk deer were discrete, cryptic and dif- Nuristan, with rock outcrops, alpine meadows, scattered currant ficult to spot. bushes, dense rhododendron, and juniper scrubs on steep slopes On  July  in a household near Waygal the team ($ °), above the tree line (.  m). photographed a dead adult female musk deer that had been hunted the previous day in the Kashtoun mountain north, and both sides of the border of Kunar province in the range (Plate ). This was the first time the species was south-east. Interview responses suggest that  years before photographed in Afghanistan. The hairs collected from the survey musk deer had a wider distribution in the this specimen were used as a standard for manual mi- south of the region, at lower elevations. According to hun- croscopy comparisons. ters in Waygal, musk deer perform seasonal altitudinal Our geographical model predicts that suitable habitat for  movements; in winter, in response to heavy snowfall, they musk deer in Afghanistan covers c. , km in the contigu- descend from preferred pastures above the tree line to ous provinces of Nuristan (.%), Kunar (.%) and coniferous forests. Laghman (.%). The largest patch of continuous suitable  The survey team recorded five sightings of – musk habitat is  km , or almost % of the total area of suitable deer, including a solitary male in the same area on three habitat, and overlaps western Nuristan, east Laghman and occasions, one female with a juvenile, and one solitary fe- west Kunar (Fig. ). In terms of ecoregions, the Hindu male (which may have been the same individual without Kush alpine meadow ecoregion is the most represented her young). All sightings were in steep (. –°) rock out- (.%), followed by East Afghan montane conifer forests crop habitat interspersed with alpine meadows and scat- (%) and Northwestern Himalayan alpine shrub and mea- tered, dense .– m high bushes of Juniperus squamata, dows (.%). The land cover within the predicted habitat

FIG. 2 Locations of suitable habitat for musk deer in Afghanistan, based on environmental requirements and preferred habitat of the species as observed in central Nuristan, Pakistan and India, and of the closely related Himalayan musk deer Moschus leucogaster in Nepal.

from Afghanistan, and the westernmost location of musk deer in Asia. In central Nuristan we found that, in summer, musk deer inhabit remote alpine scrub on scattered rock outcrops, and the upper fringes of closed coniferous forests at c. ,– , m. They invariably use steep slopes ($ °), which makes them difficult to approach and presumably difficult to hunt. According to local inhabitants musk deer spend the winter season in the undergrowth of mixed coniferous forests (possibly as low as ,–, m), where tree branches provide them with food as well as shelter from heavy snowfall. The altitudinal distribution of our musk deer sightings differs from that proposed previously (,–, m; Habibi, ) but overlaps with results of surveys carried out more recently in Azad Jammu and PLATE 2 Carcass of an adult female musk deer hunted in the Kashmir, Pakistan (,–, m; Qureshi et al., ). Kashtoun mountain range (Fig. )on July . The pattern of seasonal movements across the habitat appears to be similar to that observed in Neelum Valley, Pakistan (Qureshi et al., ). model is composed of .% closed forest, .% open forest   Our landscape-scale habitat suitability model provides and . % rock outcrop. All fragments of suitable habitats an estimate of the potential range of the musk deer in have the three types of land cover except the easternmost Afghanistan. Although relatively vast, the area of habitat areas along the international border with Pakistan, which potentially available to musk deer in Afghanistan is discon- have no rock outcrop cover. tinuous, fragmented by steep valleys with human habitation and high mountain ranges, with areas of suitable habitat sometimes separated by .  km. The preferred summer   Discussion habitat, on rock outcrops, covers only km , which suggests that the population of musk deer in Afghanistan This wildlife survey in the eastern forests of Afghanistan is small. Increasing the upper threshold for altitude in the after  decades of war indicates that the musk deer still per- geographical model to , m, to match highest altitude sists there despite unregulated hunting, extensive defores- records from Chitral, Pakistan (Roberts, ), increased  tation, habitat degradation, and the absence of rule of law. the area of suitable habitat by only  km , of which , % To our knowledge our study provides the first documented had a geographical continuity with the rest of the predicted record of the musk deer in Afghanistan since  suitable habitat. Similarly, decreasing the minimum slope to  (Hassinger, ), the first photograph of a wild specimen ° added only  km of favourable habitat. Both

modifications combined resulted in a relatively modest in- (Bader et al., ). Although the deteriorating security con- crease (, %) in the predicted extent of musk deer habitat ditions in Nuristan did not allow NGOs to remain in in Afghanistan. Nuristan after , the Wildlife Conservation Society main- The accuracy of the land cover information used in our tains contact with the local people it has trained and will model may be questionable, given the significant defores- pursue funding to continue ecosystem research and protec- tation that has taken place in the eastern forest complex of tion in Nuristan when the situation improves. Afghanistan (UNEP, ). However, habitat information for locations where musk deer were observed matched the land cover information accurately (Fig. ). More import- Acknowledgements antly, and contrary to the claims of UNEP (), a tentative assessment of forest loss and deforestation trends under- This study was made possible by the generous support of the taken during – by the Wildlife Conservation American people through the United States Agency for Society, using recent satellite imagery, did not find evidence International Development (USAID). The contents of the of large-scale deforestation of the conifer forests or signs of article are the responsibility of the Wildlife Conservation imminent ecological calamity across eastern forests Society (WCS) and do not necessarily reflect the views of (Delattre & Rahmani, ). These findings were confirmed USAID or the United States Government. Surveys would by ground assessment and overflight transect surveys car- not have been possible without the support of successive – ried out in  in Kunar, Laghman, Nuristan and WCS country directors during : Alex Dehgan, Nangarhar provinces by the Natural Resources Peter Smallwood and Dave Lawson. We thank the first Counterinsurgency Cell of the U.S. Army (Bader et al., WCS team in Nuristan for the questionnaire survey results. ). These surveys did not find significant degradation We thank Rohullah Sanger for editing the figures. of the upper-elevation coniferous forests used by musk deer, whereas the lower-elevation oak forest (, , m) was reported to have suffered significant deforestation lo- References cally (Bader et al., ). 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