Qamar Qureshi

• M.Phil
• Professor (Full) at Wildlife Institute of India

Species that rely on dens are integral to sustaining ecosystem balance, and gaining insight into their den selection patterns is essential for successful conservation efforts. The Indian Gray Wolf (Canis lupus pallipes) faces significant challenges in finding safe denning sites amidst India’s human-dominated landscapes. The survival of this species...

The spatial distribution of food shapes animal movement patterns, enabling them to optimize search behaviour and establish efficient routes for resource exploitation. Anthropogenic alteration of primate habitats, fragments available resources, and increases dependency on human food. The rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) exhibits a broad spectrum of h...

Recovery of large yet ecologically important carnivores poses a formidable global challenge. Tiger ( Panthera tigris ) recovery in India, the world’s most populated region, offers a distinct opportunity to evaluate the socio-ecological drivers of megafauna recovery. Tiger occupancy increased by 30% (at 2929 square kilometers per year) over the past...

Rhesus macaque inhabit a wide range of natural and anthropogenic landscapes, frequently experiencing agonistic interactions with humans. To understand habitat use and movement behaviour in human-modified areas, we studied two GPS tagged adult females, each from a socially distinct, similar-sized rhesus troop in Dehradun from April to August, 2022....

This study investigates the invasion patterns and ecological impacts of Lantana camara, Ageratina adenophora and Parthenium hysterophorus in the Rajaji Tiger Reserve, India. The study also delineates invasion hotspots across different forest ranges in western Rajaji. Further, in response to the persistent challenge of these invasive species, a comp...

Elephant conservation in modified landscapes requires the knowledge of how land-use mosaics influence their movement and habitat-use. We tracked 11 radio-collared elephants in Karnataka's Kodagu and Hassan districts across Protected Areas (PA), PA-adjacent plantations (PA-P), and plantations in human-dominated areas(HD). Home range of elephants in...

Despite being one of the most conflict-prone species in India, the Nilgai antelope has received little scientific attention. In this study, we address this knowledge gap by conducting an analysis of secondary data extracted from print media reports on Human-Nilgai negative interactions at the regional scale (tehsils and districts) across different...

This Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) outlines the essential criteria, actions, and precautions to be followed at the field level in cheetah introduction sites.

1. Small felids play pivotal roles in India's ecosystems, regulating prey populations, facilitating nutrient transfer, and safeguarding critical habitats. Despite their ecological significance, these species receive inadequate conservation attention, contrasting sharply with the focus on larger carnivores. Our review assesses the conservation statu...

The aim of the project is to investigate the field applicability of reproductive control in conflict mitigation, through the project titled “Population Management of Species involved in Human Wildlife Conflict”, awarded to the Wildlife Institute of India (WII), Dehradun, by The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, New Delhi. The curr...

The ecological, veterinary and management aspects of Project Cheetah on the completion of the second year of introducing cheetahs in Kuno National Park, Madhya Pradesh, India.

The Nicobar Bulbul Ixos nicobariensis is an endemic species found across the central Nicobar Islands whose systematic position has been debated for many decades. Its current placement in the genus Ixos is tentative and is based on morphological similarities and geographical affinities to other members of the genus. We used mitochondrial and nuclear...

This study addresses the lack of scientific focus on the nilgai antelope, known for conflict in its native ranges. Through a systematic media report survey, the research explores human-nilgai negative interactions in various Indian states at the regional (sub-district) level. The state of Bihar exhibited the highest impact, with 78 affected sub-dis...

Many protected areas are under tremendous anthropogenic pressure, which leads to human-elephant conflict. Thus, understanding their ranging patterns and habitat preferences would give us more knowledge and help us formulate mitigation measures. As depicted in the poster, based on the agricultural and property damage incidences, the hotspot map reve...

This study focuses on the short-term contamination and associated risks arising from the release of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) due to the 2020 Baghjan oil blowout in upper Assam, India. Shortly after the Baghjan oil blowout, samples were collected from water, sediment, and fish species and examined for PAHs contents. The results of the...

Camera trapping records of Indian Pangolin from Shergarh Wildlife sanctuary in semi arid regions of western Rajasthan

Satellite imagery has been used to provide global and regional estimates of forest cover. Despite increased availability and accessibility of satellite data, approaches for detecting forest degradation have been limited. We produce a very-high resolution 3-meter (m) land cover dataset and develop a normalized index, the Bare Ground Index (BGI), to...

Biological invasions threaten biodiversity and human wellbeing, with developing tropical countries being more vulnerable. Despite the urgency to reduce impacts of invasions, management interventions are constrained by unavailability of timely information on invasive species occurrence, potential drivers and restoration priorities. Generating this i...

While human-driven biological invasions are rapidly spreading, finding scalable and effective control methods poses an unresolved challenge. Here, we assess whether megaherbivores—herbivores reaching ≥1,000 kg of body mass—offer a nature-based solution to plant invasions. Invasive plants are generally adapted to maximize vegetative growth. Megaherb...

Non-brownian movement strategy in synanthropic Rhesus macaques. Honourable mention in the best oral presentation category.

Scavenging by vertebrates is an important ecosystem service as they are known to remove carrion more efficiently than other taxa. How long would carrion persist bereft of vertebrate scavengers? Our study addresses this question in a forested landscape, by comparing carrion utilization by vertebrate scavengers, invertebrates, and microbes (decompose...

Human activities affect wildlife in several ways, ungulates tend to avoid areas of high human use and alter their behavior to avoid human activity. We used remote camera traps to quantify the relative abundance and activity of wild ungulates in high and low human use areas within Nagarjunasagar Srisailam Tiger Reserve (NSTR). Major human activity i...

The leopard (Panthera pardus) is one of the most widespread felids worldwide. Despite their wide distribution, reliable data on leopard population densities are still inadequate for conservation and management strategies in different landscapes. In the present study, we estimated leopard density using camera traps in the Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve...

While ecosystems worldwide are confronted with myriad of biological invasions, our understanding of their consolidated impacts and control remains restricted to a few species only. Any such assessment and management based on single invasions can be biased, leading to unintentional spread of new invasive species and resulting in pessimism around inv...

The global decline of large carnivore populations warrants scientific insights into intraguild relationships. Patterns of co-occurrence among sympatric predators are governed by their density, distribution, diet, activity overlaps, and behavioural strategies. Tigers are sympatric with leopards across their distribution range, overlap substantially...

Large carnivores are vulnerable to population decline due to their k-selected traits in fragmented human-dominated landscapes. In the semi-arid landscape of western India, tiger (top predator) populations went locally extinct from most of the forested ecosystems, while the mesopredators (leopards, hyenas, wolves) managed to survive in these mosaics...

Two socially distinct Rhesus troops, designated A and B, with 56 and 64 individuals respectively, were studied in the 16 sq. km study area comprising fragmented forest patches and anthropogenic structures on the outskirts of Dehradun city. One adult female from each troop was collared with a GPS logger taking fixes at 15-minute intervals. High rev...

Capture‐recapture (CR) data and corresponding models have been used extensively to estimate the size of wildlife populations when detection probability is less than 1. When the locations of traps or cameras used to capture or detect individuals are known, spatially‐explicit CR models are used to infer the spatial pattern of the individual locations...

Understanding temporal variations in wildlife populations is a prerequisite for conservation planning of wide-ranging species such as tigers (Panthera tigris). We determined the temporal variation in abundance, population growth, and sex ratios at different age and sex stages for a tiger population in Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve, India from November...

In order to understand the generalist nature of leopards and whether they have any degree of specialization, a study on resource selection of the Indian Leopard (Panthera pardus fusca) was carried out in a tropical dry deciduous forest in Sariska Tiger Reserve, Western India from January 2007 to May 2011 with the use of camera trapping under the ma...

Ganges River dolphins echolocate, but this mechanism is inadequate for poor sonar-echoing objects such as the monofilament gillnets, causing considerable net entanglement related mortalities. Net entanglement related deaths are one of the major causes of cetacean population decline around the world. Experiments were carried out to understand the us...

p>Conservation of large carnivores is dependent on a viable population of their principal prey species. Line transect based density estimation has been established as a robust method for monitoring prey population trend. Chital ( Axis axis ) and sambar ( Rusa unicolor ) are the major ungulates in Pench tiger reserve, Madhya Pradesh that are princip...

p class="Default">The present study was conducted in Little Rann of Kutch (LRK) landscape in the Gujarat state of western India. It is a vast saline mud-plain holding the last remaining source population of Indian wild ass ( Equus hemionus khur ) or Khur after its population from other parts of the world got locally extinct. Khur occupy fringes of...

Action Plan for Introduction of Cheetah in India (With Emphasis on the First Release Site- Kuno National Park

The present study was conducted in Little Rann of Kutch (LRK) landscape in the Gujarat state of western India. It is a vast saline mud-plain holding the last remaining source population of Indian wild ass (Equus hemionus khur) or Khur after its population from other parts of the world got locally extinct. Khur occupy fringes of the Sanctuary and be...

Human modification and habitat fragmentation significantly impact large carnivores requiring large, connected habitats to persist in a landscape. Understanding species responses to such change and the protection of critical areas and connectivity they provide is essential when planning effective conservation strategies. Our study examines the spati...

The biotic resistance hypothesis suggests that biodiversity‐rich areas should be resistant to biological invasions. Globally, conservationists use this hypothesis to protect diverse ecosystems. However, supporting data are often contradictory, possibly due to several confounding factors. Complexity in inferences increases in the tropics, which are...

The Terai Arc Landscape (TAL) in the foothills of the Himalayas is one of the four major elephant ranges in India. In response to the escalating problem of crop raiding by elephants, the State Forest Department of Uttarakhand (UKFD) has built walls along the forest boundary in several protected areas and multiple‐use forest divisions. Given the hig...

Throughout the Himalaya, mountain ungulates are threatened by hunting for meat and body parts, habitat loss, and competition with livestock. Accurate population estimates are important for conservation management but most of the available methods to estimate ungulate densities are difficult to implement in mountainous terrain. Here, we tested the e...

In a world where biodiversity is on the decline, examples of conservation success especially of large carnivores are of interest to policy makers and conservation practitioners. Herein, we elucidate the conservation actions that have been responsible for the recovery of tigers and their ecosystems in India; a feat many range countries are strugglin...

Reintroduction of endangered species is an effective and increasingly important conservation strategy once threats have been addressed. The greater one-horned rhinoceros and swamp buffalo have declined through historic hunting and habitat loss. We identify and evaluate available habitat across their historic range (India, Nepal, and Bhutan) for rei...

The connectivity between landscapes is an important aspect of the conservation of small and isolated populations of carnivores. We studied the natal dispersal pattern of Bengal tigers (Panthera tigris tigris) using motion-sensitive cameras and intensive searches from April 2005 to June 2011 in Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve (RTR), western India. We tra...

Long term monitoring of large prey population is key to large carnivore conservation. A five-year study on sambar deer was conducted in the human dominated, semi-arid landscape of Sariska National Park to generate information about density, habitat use and body condition. Estimation using line transect revealed the sambar density to be 12.29/km2. R...

Understanding the social organization and acquisition of potential home ranges in solitary polygamous mammals is important for their management and conservation. However, such information requires a continuous long-term study. Therefore, limited information is available for mammals from South Asia. We studied the western most distributed Bengal tig...

Abstract Remote technologies are producing leapfrog advances in identifying the routes and connectivity of migratory species, which are still unknown for hundreds of taxa, especially Asian ones. Here, we used GPS-telemetry to uncover the migration routes and breeding areas of the massive population of migratory Black-eared kites wintering around th...

Populations of the Ganges river dolphin (Platanista gangetica gangetica) are endangered, with~3500 individuals estimated worldwide. Threats to this precarious population is exacerbated by accidental entanglement and illegal hunting for oil, which is used in bait fisheries and traditional medicine. Alternatives to dolphin oil have been proposed and...

We report the presence and status of the Irrawaddy Dolphin Orcaella brevirostris in the Hooghly River of West Bengal, India. These observations were made while conducting our field work on the Ganges River Dolphin, which involved vessel-based surveys as well as intensive monitoring from an anchored boat.

Estimating the distribution of invasive species and understanding the ecological reasons for their success is crucial for their management. Moreover, their ability to invade biogeographically distinct regions in short timespans poses interesting ecological questions. Lantana camara (sensu lato) is one such invasive species of global concern. In an...

Do you know that most humans now live in cities? This has caused a lot of trouble for many animal species. But a few opportunistic animals, like crows and pigeons that you commonly encounter in cities, benefit from dense human habitation. How does a very urbanized, paved, and populated landscape manage to support enormous flocks of birds in tropica...

Do you know that most humans now live in cities? This has caused a lot of trouble for many animal species. But a few opportunistic animals, like crows and pigeons that you commonly encounter in cities, benefit from dense human habitation. How does a very urbanized, paved, and populated landscape manage to support enormous flocks of birds in tropica...

1.Inductive generalisations based on folk perceptions for animals complement anthropogenic impacts that affect non-human species in myriad ways. Despite the surge in research on urban ecosystems, there is a poor understanding of the importance of human perceptions that affect animal-guilds subsisting on urban food-subsidies. 2.We studied the cultur...

The rusty-spotted cat Prionailurus rubiginosus is the smallest wildcat in the world, endemic to India, Nepal and Sri Lanka. Although new occurrence records have recently been reported from different geographic localities in India and Nepal, there is still a lack of information on its biology and habitat use that are required for its conservation pl...

Most large carnivore populations are declining across their global range except in some well managed protected areas (PA’s). Investments for conserving charismatic apex carnivores are often justified due to their umbrella effect on biodiversity. We evaluate population trends of two large sympatric carnivores, the tiger and leopard through spatially...

Publications in peer-reviewed journals are often looked upon as tenets on which future scientific thought is built. Published information is not always flawless and errors in published research should be expediently reported, preferably by a peer-review process. We review a recent publication by Gopalaswamy et al. ( 10.1111/2041-210X.12351 ) that c...

Ecological imbalance owing to rapid urbanization and deforestation has adversely affected the population of several wild animals. This loss of habitat has skewed the population of several non-human primate species like chimpanzees and macaques and has constrained them to co-exist in close proximity of human settlements, often leading to human-wildl...

Publications in peer reviewed journals are often looked upon as tenets on which future scientific thought is built. Published information is not always flawless and errors in published research should be expediently reported, preferably by a peer review process. We review a recent publication by Gopalaswamy et al (doi:10.1111/2041-210X.12351) that...

Ecological imbalance owing to rapid urbanization and deforestation has adversely affected the population of several wild animals. This loss of habitat has skewed the population of several non-human primate species like chimpanzees and macaques and has constrained them to co-exist in close proximity of human settlements, often leading to human-wildl...

Identifying and prioritising naturally occurring within-species diversity, which may correlate with local adaptations or vicariance, is an integral part of conservation planning. Using non-invasive sampling and a panel of 11 microsatellites on 158 individual tigers from a pan India sample, our evaluation revealed three population clusters in India:...

Human consumption and management of land, i.e., how people transmit to a landscape as a source of livelihood, shelter, recreation, or industry, are powerful forces shaping patterns and dynamics in human-occupied landscapes. Understanding and managing landscape change, therefore, requires a thorough knowledge of the developmental processes the area...

Prioritizing conservation of source populations within landscapes is proposed as a strategy for recovering tigers globally. We studied population dynamics of tigers in Corbett National Park (CNP) in Indian Terai, which harbours the largest and highest density tiger population in any protected area of the world. Through population viability models,...

Human socio-cultural factors are recognized as fundamental drivers of urban ecological processes, but their effect on wildlife is still poorly known. In particular, human cultural aspects may differ substantially between the extensively studied urban settings of temperate regions and the poorly studied cities of the tropics, which may offer profoun...

Wildlife habitat corridors are components of landscapes, which facilitate the movement of organisms and processes between areas of intact habitat, and thus provide landscape corridor as well as serve as an ideal component to study and understand physiological ecology. Corridors are thus regions within a given landscape that generally comprise nativ...

Growing urbanization is increasing human-wildlife interactions, including attacks towards humans by vertebrate predators, an aspect that has received extremely scarce investigation. Here, we examined the ecological, landscape and human factors that may promote human-aggression by raptorial Black kites Milvus migrans in the 16-millions inhabitants m...

India, a megadiverse tropical country is grappling with the issue of biological invasions. As a signatory to the Convention on Biological Diversity, India is committed for managing its major biological invasions by 2020. Lack of prioritization of invasive species for control and management is the biggest hurdle for achieving this commitment. We rev...

The Technical Report provides information about the space pattern use of reintroduced tigers in Sariska Tiger Reserve, Rajasthan between 2008 to 2018.

Publications in reputed peer reviewed journals are often looked upon as tenets on which future scientific thought is built. Sometimes published information can be flawed and errors in published research should be expediently reported, preferably by a peer review process. We review a recent publication by Gopalaswamy et al (2015) that challenges the...

Publications in reputed peer reviewed journals are often looked upon as tenets on which future scientific thought is built. Sometimes published information can be flawed and errors in published research should be expediently reported, preferably by a peer review process. We review a recent publication by Gopalaswamy et al (2015) that challenges the...

There is a growing interest in the behavioural and life history mechanisms that allow animal species to cope with rapidly expanding urban habitats, which impose frequent proximity to humans. A particular case of behavioral bottleneck (i.e. conflicting interests) faced by animals in urban environments is how they will modulate the defence of their o...

The socio-political influence on conservation science has always been contested. One such arena, which has aroused much interest, is of biological invasions. Owing to the inherent paradoxes and dilemmas in defining geographies and impacts, invasion ecology was criticized for being value-driven. The present study explores value-judgements in the evo...

Research in urban ecology is growing rapidly in response to the exponential growth of the urban environment. However, few studies have focused on tropical megacities, and on the interplay between predators’ habitat selection and human socio-economic aspects, which may mediate their resilience and coexistence with humans. We examined mechanisms of b...

Increasing rate of bear-human conflict and declining black bear population remains a conservation paradox throughout its distributional range. Sound information on the patterns and dynamics of bear occurrence seems prerequisite towards addressing this issue, particularly in sub-tropical and temperate ecosystems. We aimed to understand the patterns...