Persistence of mammals in a selectively logged forest in Malaysian Borneo

Many tropical mammals with important functional roles in forest ecosystems are threatened with extinction, yet how they respond to increasingly prevalent habitat disturbance, such as selective logging, is not well understood. We deployed 43 motion-triggered camera traps in 2013 and 2014 in unlogged forest and in a forest logged three decades previously in Malaysian Borneo. We used camera trap photographs to assess whether selective logging influenced the local abundance of medium to large-bodied ground-dwelling mammals. We focused our study on six locally common species: sambar deer, (Rusa unicolor), yellow muntjac (Muntiacus atherodes), chevrotains (Tragulus spp.), banded civet (Hemigalus derbyanus), Malay civet (Viverra tangalunga), and pig-tailed macaque (Macaca nemestrina). Occupancy models were used to estimate local abundance. None of the mammals in our study exhibited decreased abundance in logged forest, although yellow muntjac and pig-tailed macaque were associated with canopy height. Contiguous forest connects these two areas, allowing animal movement between them, potentially explaining the lack of responses. The elapsed time since logging may have further influenced our findings. The effects of logging on mammal local abundance may no longer detectable after 30 years. Overall, our results demonstrate the importance of regenerating forest as habitat for medium- to large-sized mammal species.