Human settlement ecology and chimpanzee habitat selection in Mali

Customary land-use practices create distinctive cultural landscapes, including landscapes where abandoned settlements host vegetation that attracts wild animals. Understanding how landscape patterns relate to land-use history can help clarify the ecological effects of particular land uses. This study examines relationships between chimpanzee habitat selection and Maninka settlement practice, to determine how settlement history has affected chimpanzee habitat in Mali's Bafing Biosphere Reserve, where conservation practitioners assume that the characteristic settlement pattern reflects a process of settlement expansion into undisturbed habitat. Three types of data are reported: (1) ethnographic interviews on settlement history and practice; (2) systematic sampling of chimpanzee habitat use; and (3) ground-based mapping of settlement sites, surface water, and fruit-tree patches. These data show that the Maninka have a shifting settlement system, meaning that most sites are occupied for only relatively brief periods; and that some abandoned settlement sites host fruit-tree patches that are seasonally important chimpanzee habitat. Two main conclusions are: (1) settlement expansion has not occurred; instead, historic settlement has created habitat that is both attractive and available to chimpanzees. Anthropogenic habitat does not appear to be vital for chimpanzee survival, but it spatially and temporally supplements natural habitats. (2) Conservation policies meant to reduce the presumed threat of settlement expansion may have initiated an unintended, long-term threat of habitat loss for chimpanzees. While settlement practices may be a component of short-term threats to chimpanzees, such as hunting, when addressing these threats conservation practitioners should consider long-term settlement processes to avoid creating new threats.