فهرست مطالب mahmoud reza hemami

Sand cat Felis Margarita (Felidae) is a small cat distributed in deserts of North Africa, Arabia, Central Asia, Pakistan and central Iran. This species is listed as Least Concern (LC) by IUCN and categorized on appendix II of the CITES. Successful conservation of this species demands for a comprehensive understanding of its habitat requirements. In this study, a Bayesian Belief Network (BBN) habitat suitability model was developed for sand cat through a practice of knowledge elicitation, calibration, sensitivity analysis and verification. Denning possibility, prey density, distance to Haloxylon woods, and soil stability were recognized as the most important variables determining habitat suitability of sand cat. Overall accuracy of the model was calculated at 96.7% using 120 presence/absence points collected across the species habitat in eastern Isfahan province. The results of model evaluation by sensitivity analysis and using data from fieldwork showed that the prepared model works well to determine habitat suitability. The results of this model not only combined the expert opinion and quantitative data obtained from land use maps, but also provided a good basis for use in adaptive management for the management of sand cat habitats.

Feathers as an excellent way to monitor trace metals in the environment from the 1960s have already been used. The aim of this study is using feather of laughing dove (Streptopelia senegalensis) as an indicator of urban environmental pollution.

The concentration of Cadmium, Lead, Copper and Zinc were evaluated from 58 laughing dove's feather samples from 19 different locations within the city of Yazd. Chemical digestion and atomic absorption spectrometer was used for measuring the concentration of trace metal. Weighing method by 0.001 g accuracy digital scale were used to study the index of two wing asymmetry.

Mean concentration of Lead, Cadmium, Copper and Zinc were 20.13 ± 1.27 μg g-1, 0.85± 0.04 μg g-1, 15.56 ± 0.28 μg g-1 and 209.72 ± 8.77 μg g-1. Due to heterogeneity of human activity and structure in urban environment the concentration of trace metals (lead, cadmium and zinc) showed significant differences in different local scale regions. In this study correlation was observed between Lead and Cadmium with Zinc.

Correlation pattern could simply result from correlated concentrations of these metals in the environment and could be a kind of positive feedback protection against Lead and Cadmium pollution. The results showed considerable trace metals absorption by laughing dove's feather that caused by human activity and efficiency of laughing dove's feather as an indicators of trace metal pollution in urban environment.

Over the last few decades, human threats have imposed widespread negative impacts on populations of ungulates in Iran. While, climate change may also additionally increase vulnerability of the ungulates through changing current environmental conditions in future. In this study, impact of future climate change on distribution of two vulnerable ungulates of wild sheep (Ovis sp) and wild goat (Capra aegagrus) and changes in their current distribution along altitudinal and latitudinal gradients were investigated. Future predictions were made using an ensemble modelling approach and climate data prepared by five global circulation models based on RCP 8.5. Future range shifts by 2070 were also estimated by calculating the difference between mean elevation and difference of geographic distance between centroids of current and future distribution ranges, respectively. Results indicated that as a result of climate change, more than 68% and 75% of suitable habitats for wild sheep and wild goat may become lost by 2070, respectively mostly across low elevations of southern (south Khorasan, Yazd and Fars) and central (east of Isfahan) parts. Climate change also resulted in proportions of currently unsuitable habitats to become suitable expansion of which was limited to northern part (Semnan province). Result of evaluations also revealed that current distributions of wild sheep and wild goat may change as much as 27 and 150 m and; 167 and 124 km along elevational and latitudinal gradients, respectively.