Continuity and change in hunting behaviour among contemporary indigenous peoples

1. What they did

Hunting feeds many forest peoples, but overhunting is one of the biggest threats to tropical rainforest wildlife. As indigenous societies take up schooling, wage work and market crops, their hunting may change. Some researchers expect more pressure on game (better guns, transport); others expect less, because people have less time to hunt. The authors tested this with the Tsimane’, an indigenous people of the Bolivian Amazon who hunt for food but do not sell bushmeat.

• Interviews. Between March 2009 and July 2010, they interviewed 344 Tsimane’ men (male household heads) in 40 villages, most of them more than once (1067 interviews). Each man recalled his hunting trips over the previous two weeks: what he killed (species, sex, age), who went with him, which weapons he used, and how many hours he walked to where each animal was killed.
• Integration into national society and markets. They recorded each man’s schooling, Spanish, trips to town, and income from rice, thatch palm and wage labour in logging camps.
• Game abundance. Near each village they walked ten two-hour transects (400 in all), recording calls, sightings, tracks and faeces of game species, to measure how often animals were encountered.
• Analysis. They grouped the hunters by how often they hunted, how successful they were, how much they caught per hour walked, and what kinds of animals they caught. They then grouped villages by game abundance and tested whether schooling, language and income were linked to each hunter group’s catch per hour.

2. What they found

Hunting overall

• 71% of the men had hunted in the two weeks before the interview. They reported 489 trips, 85% of them successful, and 822 animals.
• Seven species made up 70% of the kill: paca, collared peccary, coati, brown capuchin, red brocket deer, Spix’s guan and howler monkeys.
• Eight species on the IUCN Red List made up 18% of the kill, including the endangered spider monkey (2%).
• Hunters mostly used shotguns or rifles (81%), and also bow and arrow (17%). Most hunted by day (85%) and alone (61%). Most animals killed were adults (87%) and males (57%).

Four kinds of hunters

• Group A (14 hunters, 6%): hunted most often, were most successful, and brought home the most meat (about two animals and 40 kg per trip) with the shortest walks. Ungulates and birds made up 68% of their kill, and they took the largest share of vulnerable and near-threatened species, but no spider monkeys.
• Group B (42 hunters, 17%): also high yields (almost two animals, about 21 kg per trip), mostly rodents (37%, especially paca), carnivores (20%, mostly coati) and edentates and reptiles (17%). They took the fewest vulnerable species.
• Group C (28 hunters, 11%): about two animals but only 10 kg per trip. Primates made up 56% of their kill, mainly brown capuchins and howler monkeys, and they killed the most spider monkeys.
• Group D (161 hunters, 66%): the least successful (82% of trips), under one animal (about 12 kg) per trip, but the widest range of species (24), including vulnerable ones.

Game abundance and integration

• Villages fell into three groups by game abundance, but all four kinds of hunters were found in similar proportions in each.
• The hunter groups differed little in age, schooling, language or income, except that Group A earned much more from wage labour.
• Links between schooling, Spanish or income and catch per hour varied from group to group, with no common pattern. Schooling was linked to fewer animals per hour in three groups, and wage labour income to lower catches in Groups A and C. All these links disappeared in the robustness tests.

3. What they concluded

• The Tsimane’ still depend heavily on hunting. With game declining, a growing population and forest loss, both their livelihoods and their game species are increasingly vulnerable. The authors suggest hunting should ideally be regulated by local institutions.
• Different hunting practices exist side by side. A small group of skilled hunters who target vulnerable or endangered species (ungulates and primates) may harm wildlife more than a larger group with a varied prey list. Group B’s paca-based hunting probably has less impact, because pacas breed quickly.
• Group A’s hunting may be tied to thatch palm collecting and logging work deep in old-growth forest, where large mammals are more common. Group C’s monkey hunting may be tied to farming near secondary forest, or to traditional taste and medicinal preferences.
• Schooling may reduce hunting skill, because it takes young men away from time with skilled hunters.
• They found no clear link between integration into national society and markets and hunting behaviour. It may still be too early to tell.
• Limitations: the study is a snapshot, not a study over time, and it could not separate the effects of market integration from those of integration into national society.

4. How tracking was or was not used

On the game transects, the team recorded indirect signs of animals, such as tracks and faeces, along with calls and sightings, and counted them as encounters. Two Tsimane’ trained monitors, guided by local hunters, worked with the researchers, and two people are thanked for helping to identify animal tracks. The paper also notes that during the pelt trade of the 1950s to 1970s, Tsimane’ hunters mainly took part by helping outsiders to track animals. The hunters’ own tracking is not studied.

5. Tracker or observer certification

Reported but not validated. The transect monitors are described as “trained” Tsimane’ monitors guided by local hunters, and E. Tayo and F. Sarabia are thanked for help identifying animal tracks. No certification or test of their skill is reported, although the game abundance measure depends partly on track and faeces identification.

6. Other technologies, skills or innovations

• Handheld Global Positioning System (GPS) used to record each transect and the location of every game observation.
• Transect lengths measured from the GPS tracks in ArcGIS 9.2, a Geographic Information System (GIS).

7. Implications for conservation (from the paper)

• Conservation efforts in tropical forests should consider the specific impact of different hunting behaviours, rather than treating hunters, or indigenous peoples, as all the same.
• Game management could be more effective with guidelines that consider the different livelihoods within indigenous societies and households.
• Identifying hunting behaviours can help assess hunting impact on different game groups, and could raise community awareness of how sustainable their hunting is.
• Understanding how indigenous livelihoods link to national society and markets is key to policies that support both indigenous peoples’ own development and biodiversity, such as community-based management.