Short Communication |
Corresponding author: Cristina Vargas Cademartori ( cristina.cademartori@unilasalle.edu.br ) Academic editor: Bernardo Urbani
© 2022 Diego Floriano da Rocha, Thaís Brauner do Rosario, Ana Carolina Pontes Maciel, Duana Suelem Alves, Cristina Vargas Cademartori.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
da Rocha DF, do Rosario TB, Maciel ACP, Alves DS, Cademartori CV (2022) Record of occurrence of Nasua nasua (Linnaeus, 1766) (Carnivora, Procyonidae) in a densely urbanized area of the city of Canoas, southern Brazil. Neotropical Biology and Conservation 17(2): 111-116. https://doi.org/10.3897/neotropical.17.e81824
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The South American coati is a carnivore with a wide distribution in South America. Despite this, it is considered a threatened species in Rio Grande do Sul, as Vulnerable, primarily because of the loss of forest habitats. We recorded a Nasua nasua individual at the Canoas airbase, one of the last remaining green spaces in a densely urbanized area in southern Brazil. This confirms the capability of this species to use environments that have been changed by anthropic activity. It also highlights the relevance of green spaces in urban areas for wildlife conservation.
deforestation, habitat loss, medium sized mammals, South American coati, threatened species, urban ecology, urban green space
Nasua nasua (Linnaeus, 1766) is a medium-sized carnivore (body mass: ≈ 5 kg) with diurnal and arboreal habits in forest ecosystems (
Nasua nasua has a wide distribution in South America. It extends from Colombia and Venezuela to Uruguay and northern Argentina (
In this communication, we report a record of a Nasua nasua individual obtained on August 12, 2020 at 07:35 at the Canoas Airbase, Canoas Municipality, Rio Grande do Sul (see Suppl. material
The animal was detected during mammal surveys conducted from June to November 2020, using six camera traps (model: Bushnell Trophy Cam XLT). Camera traps were set up at 22 different sampling points, each at a minimum distance of 200 m from the others, at heights of around 30 m from the ground. The criterion for choice of camera trap sites was presence of arboreal vegetation. Each site was sampled for 30 consecutive days. The camera traps were programmed to film for 20 seconds with a one minute interval between films and were checked every 15 days. We conducted a total of 5 sampling months and a sampling effort of 720 trap-days. The animal observed was probably a male, because male adults are solitary (
There have been no recent records of N. nasua in Rio Grande do Sul in the more densely populated parts of the Porto Alegre metropolitan area, which comprises 34 municipal districts (
This record confirms the capacity of this species to use environments that have been changed by anthropic activity (
We are grateful to the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) for awarding a Masters bursary to the first author. We would also like to thank the staff of the Canoas Airbase for their cooperation with this survey. Finally, we thank Robert James Coulthard for language support and the reviewers, whose comments improved this article.
South American Coati at the Canoas airbase
Data type: Multimedia
Explanation note: Record of South American Coati at the Canoas airbase in Rio Grande do Sul.