Niall P. McCann’s scientific contributions

We report the first camera-trap photographic record of the puma Puma concolor in Cusuco National Park, Honduras, in the Merendón Mountain Range on the border of Honduras and Guatemala. This is the first conclusive evidence of puma presence in this area, despite extensive surveys carried out over the past 17 years. Similarly, the first and only jaguar Panthera onca record from this area was attained in Cusuco National Park in 2015. Although resident populations of jaguars and pumas seem to be absent from this area, these sporadic records, potentially single migrants, indicate the importance of the binational Merendón Range for the connectivity of large wild cats.

Terrestrial mammals are important ecosystem engineers in rainforest but threatened by deforestation and hunting even in areas with the highest level of designated protection e.g. National Parks. Species Distribution Models (sdMs) can be used to identify priority areas for vulnerable species informing the spatial allocation of conservation resources. Local sdMs do not rely on defining positive relationships that determine a species' optimal environmental niche but the negative relationships describing parochial species absence. Using species-specific field tracks and signs data from 2006 to 2017 for mammals in Cusuco National Park, Honduras, we built local sdMs for each species extrapolating the probability of occurrence throughout unsurveyed areas. We pooled predicted probabilities within species groups for i) low abundance, large-bodied, hunted species (e.g. tapir, deer or peccaries), ii) high abundance, small-bodied hunted species (e.g. paca or agouti) and iii) unhunted species (e.g. mustelids or wild cats). Results suggest that that despite the highest level of protected area designation local terrestrial mammal distribution was driven by local Abstract Article info Resumen extendido anthropogenic disturbance; specifically, deforestation within 2km, distance to the National Park boundary and distance to human populations i.e. proximity to villages (though not their population size), ecotour-ism camps and research stations. Local villages were ranked in descending order of their likely impact on large hunted mammals such that local Government departments, forestry managers, conservation organisations and patrolling wardens can use this information to target protection efforts (patrols, legislative enforcement and prosecutions) to maximise the efficacy of National Park designation and stem ongoing defaunation. Los mamíferos terrestres son importantes ingenie-ros de ecosistemas en la selva tropical, pero están amenazados por la deforestación y la caza incluso en áreas con el más alto nivel de protección desig-nada, como en parques nacionales. El Parque Na-cional Cusuco cubre 23,440 hectáreas de territorio protegido en la cordillera de Merendón, Cortés, noroeste de Honduras (15°32′31″ N, 88°15′ 49″ W). Está catalogada como la 123 área protegida más insustituible (48 considerando taxones amenaza-dos solamente) a nivel mundial de los 173,000 sitios designados. Contiene bosque seco tropical de tie-rras bajas, bosque húmedo tropical, bosque nuboso montano y bosque enano localizado por encima de los 2.000 m sobre el nivel del mar. Tiene una rica diversidad de mamíferos terrestres (Hoskins et al. 2018); sin embargo, estos están altamente amena-zados debido a la deforestación y la caza ilegal. Se prevé la destrucción total de la fauna del parque para mediados de la década de 2020 (Hoskins et al. 2020). Este estudio utilizó modelos de distribución de especies (sdM) para comprender los causantes antropogénicos locales que afectan los rangos de mamíferos dentro del Parque Nacional Cuscuo. El objetivo específico era analizar la presencia de es-pecies en relación con los impactos humanos clave, como la proximidad a las rutas de acceso (por ejem-plo, carreteras o pueblos) o el estado de protección (por ejemplo, el límite del Parque Nacional o las designaciones zonales internas), teniendo en cuenta a la vez los efectos de la variación ambiental natural en las variables bioclimáticas (por ejemplo, tempe-ratura media anual y precipitaciones). Se planteó la hipótesis de que la probabilidad de presencia de mamíferos estaría asociada negativamente con per-turbaciones antropogénicas. Utilizando datos especie-específicos sobre sig-nos y señales colectados en el campo desde 2006 a 2017, creamos sdMs a escala local para cada especie de mamífero para la cual había un tamaño de mues-tra suficiente mediante la extrapolación de la proba-bilidad de su ocurrencia en áreas no muestreadas.

Cloud forests are amongst the most biologically unique, yet threatened, ecosystems in Mesoamerica. We summarize the ecological value and conservation status of a well-studied cloud forest site: Cusuco National Park (CNP), a 23,440 ha protected area in the Merendón mountains, northwest Honduras. We show cnp to have exceptional biodiversity; of 966 taxa identified to a species-level to date, 362 (37.5%) are Mesoamerican endemics, 67 are red-listed by the IUCN, and at least 49 are micro-endemics known only from the Merendón range. CNP also provides key ecosystem services including provision of drinking water and downstream flood mitigation, as well as carbon sequestration, with an estimated stock of 3.5 million megagrams of carbon in 2000. Despite its ecological importance, CNP faces multiple environmental threats and associated stresses, including deforestation (1,759 ha since 2000 equating to 7% of total forest area), poaching (7% loss of mammal relative abundance per year), amphibian declines due to chytridiomycosis (70% of species threatened or near-threatened), and climate change (a mean 2.6 °C increase in temperature and 112 mm decrease in rainfall by 2100). Despite conservation actions, including community ranger patrols, captive-breeding programmes, and ecotourism initiatives, environmental degradation of CNP continues. Further action is urgently required, including reinforcement and expansion of ranger programmes, greater stakeholder engagement, community education programmes, development of alternative livelihood projects, and legislative enforcement and prosecution. Without a thorough and rapid response to understand and mitigate illegal activities, the extirpation and extinction of species and the loss of vital ecosystem services are inevitable in the coming decades.

Macroecological analyses capture the widespread nature of wild mammal range contractions and population declines globally, with Neotropical rainforests particularly vulnerable. Yet there is a paucity of basic population biology data capturing local empirically observed population changes. We generated species-specific and aggregated temporal trends in populations of terrestrial mammals in Cusuco National Park, north-west Honduras testing the effects of body-size, hunting and zonal protection measures. Hunted species, regardless of body size, exhibited declines (ca. -7% per year) with greater rapidity of decline in the park’s more accessible and less rigorously protected buffer zone. The site was once regarded as a remaining strong of Baird’s tapir (Tapirus bairdii), IUCN Red Listed as Endangered, but our data suggest its near local extirpation from monitored sites. Hunted deer (Mazama temama and Odocoileus virginianus) and paca (Cuniculus paca) also declined substantially. Whilst specific-species trends varied among unhunted species (e.g. wild cats, mustelids etc.) they, nevertheless, also exhibited an aggregated decline throughout the park (ca. -6% per year). Such was the rapidity of these declines that we estimate complete mammalian defaunation of Cusuco National Park by the mid-2020s leaving a notionally highly protected area mostly devoid of terrestrial mammals and the associated ecosystem services they deliver (so-called ‘empty forest syndrome’). We call on Governments and non-governmental organizations including conservation charities to prioritize urgent efforts to secure funding and personnel to ensure designated areas are adequately protected with enforcement of existing legislative protection whether through patrols or capacity building to efficiently curtail ongoing defaunation.

Neotropical cloud forests are one of the most biodiverse yet threatened ecosystems with deforestation and hunting creating major problems. We report a non-volant mammal species inventory for Cusuco National Park, Honduras, spanning 2006-2016. Data were collected using 4 methods: tracks and signs, camera trapping, direct sightings and live trapping. Recorded species of conservation importance included Central American red brocket (Mazama temama (Kerr, 1792)), Baird's tapir (Tapirus bairdii (Gill, 1865)), margay (Leopardus wiedii (Schinz, 1821)), and jaguar (Panthera onca (Lin-naeus, 1758)); the latter recorded for the first time. Cusuco National Park is a site of strategic geographical importance within the Central American jaguar corridor. In total, 43 species were recorded from 26 families. We demonstrate the impact of zonal protection measures with higher mammal abundance recorded in the park's highly protected core compared to the less protected buffer zone. We advise continued monitoring to provide robust time-series of population trends.