Conservation GIS Project: Eld's Deer
Saving the Skittish Eld's Deer Eld's Deer in Myanmar
Also known as the Eld's or brow-antlered deer (Cervus thamin), the thamin is a flagship species of southern Asia's rapidly disappearing dry dipterocarp forests.
Chatthin Wildlife Sanctuary
Four years of ecological research on the thamin have been completed at Chatthin Wildlife Sanctuary in Myanmar (Burma). This 400-square-mile protected area on the Tropic of Cancer is the last stronghold of the species in Asia. Even so, the Indaing forest is degraded and under great pressure from local communities for crop land and timber.
Numbers
At the end of 1996, 12 thamin were wearing radio collars, which transmitted data. Two radio-collared deer were killed by predators, two dispersed about six kilometers and then returned to the park, and six more were captured and instrumented.
The radio-trackers have now managed to habituate the deer to closer observation, and during the spring flush they were able to witness a grazing aggregation of more than 30 animals.
Future Work
Male home range is about 8 square kilometers, while females live in
a quarter of the area. These are much larger home ranges than
those of north temperate species such as the white-tailed
deer. It also became clear that annual fire and monsoon flooding
are important determinants of thamin life history, and future
work will focus on these factors.
