Walfrido Moraes Tomas

Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA) | Embrapa · Embrapa Pantanal

Oecomys cleberi is an arboreal rodent little known reagarding its natural history, distribution, and ecology. In this paper, we present new records of O. cleberi within a region of the Atlantic Forest, in a transition zone with Cerrado, in the northwestern state of São Paulo. We investigated the effects of the structure of fragmented landscapes on...

A Bacia do Alto Paraguai (BAP), onde está localizado o Pantanal, encontra-se no centro da América do Sul e apresenta contato com diferentes biomas, como a Amazônia, o Cerrado, a Mata Atlântica, o Chaco e a Floresta Chiquitana. A flora e a fauna da região são influenciadas principalmente pelo Cerrado, mas os demais biomas também contribuem para a ri...

Background Brazil is the largest exporter of soybeans worldwide. Albeit its economic importance, soybean expansion has led to important land use and land cover changes. In this paper, we evaluate the impact of soybean expansion on ecotourism, using as a case study of the Prata River (Bonito), Brazil; tourist destination where over 30,000 tourists p...

Study reveals that small animals in the Pantanal can use underground shelters to survive fires

The Pantanal wetland harbours the second largest population of jaguars in the world. Alongside climate and land-use changes, the recent mega-fires in the Pantanal may pose a threat to the jaguars' long-term survival. To put these growing threats into perspective, we addressed the reach and intensity of fires that have affected jaguar conservation i...

Apresentamos uma revisão dos diferentes aspectos relacionados aos mamíferos artiodáctilos nativos da Bacia do Alto Paraguai (BAP), área que compreende a planície pantaneira e os planaltos adjacentes, representados por duas espécies da família Tayassuidae (Tayassu pecari e Pecari tajacu) e quatro da família Cervidae (Blastocerus dichotomus, Mazama a...

Twenty-one years ago, Gottgens and colleagues (2001) warned in this journal of the tragic consequences of a planned waterway in one of the world's largest and most diverse wetlands: the Pantanal. The authors explored the waterway's potential damages, and discussed how the accumulation of small, wrong decisions may lead the Pantanal to collapse. Got...

Abstract. Several phytogeographic regions (Cerrado, Pantanal, Atlantic Forest, Gran Chaco, and Chiquitano Dry Forests) converge in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil, and influence regional biodiversity. Despite a list of birds in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul being published by Nunes et al. (2017), it is necessary to update and critically r...

The drought and wildfires that swept through Pantanal, the major South American wetland, in 2020 severely impacted the local biota. The resilience of native species to these types of extreme events remains largely unknown. During post-wildfire surveys at recently affected sites, we found three burrows containing the semi-aquatic Chacoan marsh rats...

Anthropogenic factors have significantly influenced the frequency, duration, and intensity of meteorological drought in many regions of the globe, and the increased frequency of wildfires is among the most visible consequences of human-induced climate change. Despite the fire role in determining biodiversity outcomes in different ecosystems, wildfi...

The Pantanal floodplains of Brazil are a region of rich biodiversity. To date, the true richness of the Pantanal avifauna has not been explored satisfactorily caused by a lack of studies in the region and, especially, by the divergence of opinion among the works published by various authors on the many species found in the region. This is due to th...

Anthropogenic factors have significantly influenced the frequency, duration, and intensity of meteorological drought in many regions of the globe, and the increased frequency of wildfires is among the most visible consequences of human-induced climate change. Despite its role in determining biodiversity outcomes in different ecosystems, wildfires c...

O Brasil tem vivenciado incêndios sem precedentes na última década. Imagens de imensas áreas queimadas ou animais mortos que não conseguiram escapar dos incêndios em 2020 chocaram o mundo. Para prevenir ou minimizar desastres similares no futuro nós devemos compreender os fatores que levaram a esses eventos catastróficos. As causas e consequências...

Brazil has experienced unprecedented wildfires in the last decade. Images of immense burnt areas or deadanimals that failed to escape the 2020 wildfires have shocked the world. To prevent or minimize furthersimilar disasters we must understand the factors that have led to these catastrophic events. The causes andconsequences of wildfires entail com...

Habitat loss is a main reason for population declines and thus increases extinction risk, particularly for endemic or specialist species. While protected areas are an important biodiversity conservation strategy in the face of native vegetation conversion, local and regional factors, such as anthropogenic pressure can jeopardise their effectiveness...

Species distribution models have been used to assist decision-making in many different aspects of conservation, restoration, and environmental management. However, to apply species distribution models effectively, we need to discriminate between suitable and unsuitable environments and the models need to be developed at fine scales (i.e. covering s...

Smoke from wildfires worsened the situation of isolated, as well as urban communities, already under an increasing toll of COVID-19. Here we review the impacts and the possible causes of the 2020 mega-fires and recommend improvements for public policies and fire management in this wetland. We calculated the amount of area burnt annually since 2003...

URL providing 50 days' free access: https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1d8aq14Z6thO2i In the Brazilian Pantanal, wildfire occurrence has increased, reaching record highs of over 40,000 km² in 2020. Smoke from wildfires worsened the situation of isolated, as well as urban communities, already under an increasing toll of COVID-19. Here we review the impa...

South America’s Pantanal is recognized as one of the largest wetlands in the world and a UNESCO World Heritage Site for its ecological significance (high biodiversity). The region experiences both seasonal wet/dry periods and pluriannual cycles of wet and dry years. Vegetation changes throughout the year as well as over the long-term with fires and...

The Program for Biodiversity Research (PPBio) is an innovative program designed to integrate all biodiversity research stakeholders. Operating since 2004, it has installed long-term ecological research sites throughout Brazil and its logic has been applied in some other southern-hemisphere countries. The program supports all aspects of research nec...

As a consequence of accelerated and excessive use of pesticides in tropical regions, wilderness areas are under threat; this includes the Pantanal wetlands in the Upper Paraguay River Basin (UPRB). Using a Land Cover Land Use Change (LCLUC) modelling approach, we estimated the expected pesticide load in the Pantanal and the surrounding highlands re...

The Program for Biodiversity Research (PPBio) is an innovative program designed to integrate all biodiversity research stakeholders. Operating since 2004, it has installed long-term ecological research sites throughout Brazil and its logic has been applied in some other southern-hemisphere countries. The program supports all aspects of research nec...

The Pantanal wetland has been a constant object of research due to its complex ecosystem, with a high quantity and diversity of landscapes. Knowing the macrohabitats found in the areas that make up the Pantanal provides a considerable information framework, which enables to assist in the decision-making processes for their maintenance and conservat...

Although they occupy only 3% of the global surface area, wetlands represent 43.5% of the global monetary value provided by ecosystem services (ES). The Pantanal is one of the biggest wetland areas and provides many types of ES as goods and services for humanity, including a highly diversified flora and fauna; food, freshwater, and pastureland; clim...

Biodiversity loss is currently one of the most important societal concerns worldwide, and it is caused mainly by habitat loss and fragmentation, biological invasion, and climate change (Vitousek et al. 1996, Newbold et al. 2015, Bellard et al. 2016). Introduced species can have positive effects on human well‐being, especially when used for liveliho...

Mammalian carnivores are considered a key group in maintaining ecological health and can indicate potential ecological integrity in landscapes where they occur. Carnivores also hold high conservation value and their habitat requirements can guide management and conservation plans. The order Carnivora has 84 species from 8 families in the Neotropica...

Building bridges between environmental and political agendas is essential nowadays in face of the increasing human pressure on natural environments, including wetlands. Wetlands provide critical ecosystem services for humanity and can generate a considerable direct or indirect income to the local communities. To meet many of the sustainable develop...

CHC JUNHO 2020 | 3 Ilustrações Bruna Assis Brasil Doença de bicho ou de gente? Coronavírus não é nome de doença, é nome de uma família de vírus. Esses vírus podem provocar doenças respiratórias em humanos. SARS-CoV-2 é o nome do coronavírus que provoca a doença chamada covid-19-essa que se espalhou pelo mundo todo e fez adoecer muita gente aqui no...

Na natureza, as chances de um patógeno, como um vírus, causar danos à saúde – ou mesmo a morte – de seus hospedeiros específicos (humanos ou animais) é reduzida. Porém, as doenças infecciosas têm avançado, e o exemplo mais evidente é a atual pandemia da Covid-19. A razão mais forte para esses cenários está na quebra das chamadas barreiras sanitária...

Animal mating systems provide key insights into the relationship between evolutionary processes and ecological factors such as the spatio-temporal fuctuation of resource abundance. Characteristics of mating systems can be inferred from the spatial distribution of conspecifcs and the arrangement of reproductive pairs. Here we used home-range size an...

The consumption of fruits and floral resources, as core or complementary food items, occurs in 75% of phyllostomid species. If phylogenetically related bat species have similar plant species in their diets, then it is expected that vegetal resources composition influences the phylogenetic structure of phyllostomid assemblages. We ask here if the ph...

The ocelot Leopardus pardalis (Linnaeus, 1758) is a nocturnal opportunistic felid that has a wide geographic distribution in almost every American continent. Although this species is classified as Least Concern, its populations have been declining as a direct consequence of the destruction of their habitats. Information on the density, occupancy an...

Building bridges between environmental and political agendas is essential nowadays in face of the increasing human pressure on natural environments, including wetlands. Wetlands provide critical ecosystem services for humanity, and can generate a considerable direct or indirect income to the local communities. In order to meet many of the sustainab...

Building bridges between environmental and political agendas is essential nowadays in face of the increasing human pressure on natural environments, including wetlands. Wetlands provide critical ecosystem services for humanity and can generate a considerable direct or indirect income to the local communities. To meet many of the sustainable develop...

RESUMO-A caça foi proibida no Brasil em 1967, pela lei que ficou conhecida como "Lei de Proteção à Fauna". Desde então, nenhuma política efetiva de gestão de fauna foi estabelecida no país. As consequências são graves, uma vez que a caça nunca foi plenamente controlada, e continua sendo comumente praticada em todas as regiões do Brasil. Além disso,...

The objective of this work was to estimate an index of the relative biomass per species, in a medium to large-sized mammal community, as well as to determine how the introduced wild boar (Sus scrofa) fits into this index, and to verify if the occupancy of sites by domestic dogs interferes with those of wild boars and how much the periods of dogs’ a...

Esse trabalho descreve um protocolo aplicável à avaliação e monitoramento dos impactos da queima de vegetação no Pantanal, sejam elas naturais, incêndios causados pelo homem, ou ainda práticas de manejo como a queima controlada e a queima prescrita da vegetação. Protocolos desta natureza são fundamentais para a aplicação prática de boas formas de u...

With the advancement of wild boar distribution in the rural environment, its impacts are not limited to health in the pig sector, but the requirements for monitoring and control of the species are requirements laid down by the OIE for the recognition of classical swine fever free zone status. The construction of ecological models of favorability or...

The birds of most elevated parts of hills in western Pan-tanal are little known, mentioned only in general compilations. We report on the avifauna from western Pantanal wetland. It was recorded a total of 412 bird species, of which 24% are regularly migratory (16 Northern species and 84 Southern species). At least 7 species are in the lists of exti...

A adoção do conceito de “mesma identidade ecológica” pelo Supremo Tribunal Federal - STF, no julgamento da ADI 3547 MC/PR, em 2017, constitui-se numa tentativa de se garantir que as características bioecológicas das Áreas de Reserva Legal – ARL (p.e., biodiversidade, serviços ecossistêmicos, padrões edafo-climáticos), ainda não designadas em uma da...

The spotted paca Cuniculus paca (Linnaeus, 1766) is a medium-sized caviomorph rodent of the Cuniculidae family that mainly inhabits tropical forests, but may occur in other habitat types, often associated with water bodies. We aimed to verify which factors influence the spatial and temporal distribution of C. paca in the Vale Natural Reserve (VNR),...

The effects of Brazil's political crisis on science funding necessary for biodiversity conservation are likely to be global. Brazil is not only the world's most biodiverse nation, it is responsible for the greater part of the Amazon forest, which regulates the climate and provides rain to much of southern South America. Brazil was a world leader in...

The effects of Brazil’s political crisis on science funding necessary for biodiversity conservation are likely to be global. Brazil is not only the world’s most biodiverse nation, it is responsible for the greater part of the Amazon forest, which regulates the climate and provides rain to much of southern South America. Brazil was a world leader in...

Context: Population estimation and monitoring are important tools for the support of programs and actions of conservation for most wildlife species, including birds. For validation of such support, a set of reliable, consistent and comparable parameter estimates is essential (through systematic monitoring over time), in addition to studies on ecolo...

Collared and white-lipped peccaries (Pecari tajacu and Tayassu pecari, respectively) are widely distributed, herd-forming ungulates that are sympatric in a variety of Neotropical ecosystems. Patterns of co-occurrence and niche partitioning are still poorly understood in sympatric peccary populations in the Atlantic Forest. We aimed to test the hypo...