• Korean Journal of Veterinary Service
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• v.35 no.1
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• pp.39-45
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• 2012

This survey aims to provide information on the pattern of distress in wild avian animals in Gangwon province. This survey is based on 315 wild avian which were rescued by the Kangwon University Wildlife Rescue Center. The data was collected at the Wildlife Animal Center from September 2007 to August 2010, and by analyzing the shape of the wild animals killed or injured, the center seeks an efficient and systematic way to manage such distress. There are 55 species found, in this study including 40 common kestrel, 34 eurasian eagles, 20 common buzzards, 20 collared scops owls, 19 oriental scops owls, 16 brown hawk owls and 160 others. These are the results of the survey: 129 (40.3%) of 315 avian birds were found between June and August. Many cases in that term were observed falling from the nest or losing their mother because of unskilled flight during the breeding season's flight practicing process. Between November and December, 64 individual (20.3%) were found, and it's the second largest number. The main reasons for these results were starvation and exhaustion from the winter migratory season. The results indicated that the main reason for avian distress came from the following: collision with architecture windows in 73 cases (23.2%), starvation and exhaustion in 63 cases (20.0%), collision with vehicles in 51 cases (16.2%), becoming orphaned in 69 cases (21.9%), trespassing into buildings occurred in 19 cases (6.0%), collision with electric wires in 18 cases (5.7%), poaching materials in 13 cases (4.1%), becoming entangled by fishing wire and other miscellaneous materials in 4 cases (1.3%), infection from parasites in 4 cases (1.3%), toxicosis from such toxins like agricultural chemicals in 1 case (0.3%). Overall, the purpose of this investigation was to analyze cases of avian distress in Korea's wildlife. This study used areas, seasons and causes to understand origins of these animals distress. So that it can be utilized for organized wild avian rescue and treatment.

• Proceedings of the National Institute of Ecology of the Republic of Korea
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.103-114
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• 2022

Zoological Parks house exclusive animal species, thus creating a source of education and awareness for visitors. Big cats like tigers and leopards are among the most visited species in zoos globally. However, they often display stressful or stereotypic behaviours. Such behaviours are influenced by multiple factors including visitors, animal history, and captive environment. To understand this impact, we investigated the behavioural response of tigers and leopards to visitation, captive, and biological factors. The behaviour of eight big cats housed in the National Zoological Park, New Delhi, was monitored using focal sampling technique during May and June 2019. We recorded the captive and biological factors and visitor density for the subjects. The study revealed high proportions of inactive and stereotypic behaviours amongst the species. Tigers and leopards were found to perform stereotypic behaviours for 22% and 28% of their time, respectively. Generalised Linear Models revealed a significant variation of stereotypy in association with the factors. Stereotypy was influenced by visitor density, age, sex, breeding history, coat colour, and enclosure design. Adults, males, white-coated, previously bred, and those housed in smaller and simple enclosures display more stereotypy than young, females, normal-coated, unbred, and those housed in larger and complex enclosures, respectively. A high density of visitors induced more stereotypic behaviours amongst the big cats. As providing entertainment and awareness amongst the public is one of the fundamental objectives of the zoo, visitors can not be avoided. Thus, we suggest providing appropriate enrichments that would reduce stereotypies and promote naturalistic behaviours.

• Ecology and Resilient Infrastructure
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.169-176
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• 2016

Roads are widely accepted to be as a major cause of habitat fragmentation. The wildlife road-crossing structure is one of the most acceptable alternatives among the solutions to provide connectivity between patches isolated by roads. We investigated noise disturbance, vegetation structure and wildlife crossing and habitation at a wildlife road-crossing structure located at the Jingmaei-Pass in Incheon, Korea, to monitor and evaluate its conservation value and ecological performance and to propose measures for their adaptive management. From the result of noise measurement, the noise disturbance from the road traffic was not properly blocked out at the wildlife crossing structure. The survey results of vegetation structure showed that the early-successional plant species such as Ambrosia trifida, Erigeron annuus, Pueraria lobata, Rosa multiflora invaded widely on the crossing structure. An efficient management of the vegetation should be necessarily considered for the facilitation of vegetation succession and the improvement of animal habitat. The crossing structure was used by limited mammal species: Apodemus agrarius, Nyctereutes procyonoides, Mogera wogura and Sciurus vulgaris coreae as the results of the monitoring using footprints and closed-circuit television. In conclusion, The Jingmaei-Pass wildlife crossing structure is unable to function properly as a biological corridor because of the interference of noise and flourishing disturbed vegetation. Therefore, proper alternatives are required for improving animal habitats and mobile environments to enhance the ecological function of a wildlife corridor.

• Animal Systematics, Evolution and Diversity
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.48-53
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• 2012

The tiger population that once inhabited the Korean peninsula was initially considered a unique subspecies (Panthera tigris coreensis), distinct from the Amur tiger of the Russian Far East (P. t. altaica). However, in the following decades, the population of P. t. coreensis was classified as P. t. altaica and hence forth the two populations have been considered the same subspecies. From an ecological point of view, the classification of the Korean tiger population as P. t. altaica is a plausible conclusion. Historically, there were no major dispersal barriers between the Korean peninsula and the habitat of Amur tigers in Far Eastern Russia and northeastern China that might prevent gene flow, especially for a large carnivore with long-distance dispersal abilities. However, there has yet to be a genetic study to confirm the subspecific status of the Korean tiger. Bone samples from four tigers originally caught in the Korean peninsula were collected from two museums in Japan and the United States. Eight mitochondrial gene fragments were sequenced and compared to previously published tiger subspecies' mtDNA sequences to assess the phylogenetic relationship of the Korean tiger. Three individuals shared an identical haplotype with the Amur tigers. One specimen grouped with Malayan tigers, perhaps due to misidentification or mislabeling of the sample. Our results support the conclusion that the Korean tiger should be classified as P. t. altaica, which has important implications for the conservation and reintroduction of Korean tigers.

• Molecules and Cells
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.314-318
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• 2008

Korean long-tailed goral (Nemorhaedus caudatus) is one of the most endangered species in South Korea. However, detailed species distribution and sex ratio data on the elusive goral are still lacking due to difficulty of identification of the species and sex in the field. The primary aim of this study was to develop an economical PCR-RFLP method to identify species using invasive or non-invasive samples from five Korean ungulates: goral (N. caudatus), roe deer (Capreolus pygargus), feral goat (Capra hircus), water deer (Hydropotes inermis) and musk deer (Moschus moschiferus). The secondary aim was to find more efficient molecular sexing techniques that may be applied to invasive or non-invasive samples of ungulate species. We successfully utilized PCR-RFLP of partial mitochondrial cytochrome b gene (376 bp) for species identification, and sex-specific amplification of ZFX/Y and AMELX/Y genes for sexing. Three species (goral, goat and water deer) showed distinctive band patterns by using three restriction enzymes (Xbal, Stul or Sspl). Three different sexing primer sets (LGL331/335 for ZFX/Y gene; SE47/48 or SE47/53 for AMELX/Y gene) produced sex-specific band patterns in goral, goat and roe deer. Our results suggest that the molecular analyses of non-invasive samples might provide us with potential tools for the further genetic and ecological study of Korean goral and related species.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.615-625
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• 2015

This study examined the effects of wildlife or wildlife species on national park visitors' perception of place attributes and recreational experiences. Data were collected from 502 users of Seongsamjae Rest area and Nogodan Shelter area in Jirisan National Park and 173 college students during May-June 2014 using survey questionnaire. Some simulated photographs of water deer and Asiatic black bears were used for the college student survey. Overall, awareness about wildlife inhabiting in Jirisan National Park (AW) was not related with one's perception of place attributes (PPA) (i.e., crowdedness, naturalness, safety) and types of visitors' recreational experiences. Respondents with higher awareness about the presence of Asiatic black bear (AABB), however, tended to perceive Jirisan National Park as a place that provides 'wild' or 'natural' recreational opportunities compared to those with lower AABB. Differences in PPA (i.e., crowdedness, naturalness, safety) and types of recreational experiences were also found to be influenced by wildlife species. Respondents exposed to bear or water deer tended to perceive their recreational experiences as more 'wild'. Existence of wildlife in Jirisan National Park had a positive effect on the quality of visitors' recreational experiences. Different wildlife species showed different levels of effectiveness to quality enhancement of recreational experience. Some practical implications of the study were discussed from a managerial point of view.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.69-80
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• 2021

The new town in Korea, developed as a large-scale housing plan, has created urban ecological corridors to provide habitat and movement routes to wildlife and to promote natural ecological flow. This study aimed to investigate the use of wildlife in 10 ecological corridors in Gwanggyo New Town through camera trap technology and confirm effectiveness by identifying environmental factors affecting the use of wildlife's urban ecological corridors. Our researchers installed 20 unmanned sensor cameras at each the entrance and exit of the ecological corridors, and monitored urban wildlife for 10 weeks. According to the monioring results, the main species in Gwanggyo New Town were identified not only raccons, cats, water deer, korean hare and avain but also magpies, dove, eurasian tree sparrow, ring-necked pheasant, and eurasian jay. The number of uses ecological corridors of urban residents was 801(13.49%), as high as that of urban wildlife (1,140, 19.20%), which was judged to have disturbed the use of ecological corridors by wildlife. However, most dominant species of urban wildlife are nocturnal so that, it was judged that they share home range with urban residents at a time interval. In addition, according to the correlation analysis results between the mammal using rate of the urban ecological corridors and environmental factors(ecological corridor-specific length, ecological corridor-specific width, cover degree, shielding degree, connected green area, separation of movement routes, and presence of streetlights), environmental factors were not statistically significant. However, the more the area of green space connected to ecological corridors, the more increasing the mammal using rate of ecological corridor(r=0.71, p<0.05). Therefore, the area of green space connected to the ecological corridors that is associated with rate of wildlife using corridors should be considered as a priority when developing an urban ecological corridors. In the future, this study will extend the observation period of the ecological corridors and continuously accumulate data by adding the number of observation cameras. Furthermore, it is expected that the results of this study can be used as basic data for the standards for urban ecological corridors installation.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.37 no.5
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• pp.337-346
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• 2023

Although wildlife bridge are built as a way to reduce habitat fragmentation caused by road construction, there is still a lot of debate about their effectiveness. Monitoring methods such as footprint traps and camera traps are used evaluate the effectiveness of wildlife bridge, but there is a limit to evaluate of effectiveness. In this study, the degree of use the wildlfe bridge was surveyed by striped field mouse that is likely use the wildlife bridge and surrounding as a habitat with capture-mark-recapture method.(Apodemus agraius). The distance and route of movement were identified by connecting the capture points, and the environmental factors on the use of the wildlife bridge implemented a generalized linear model(GLM) with the capture number of captured as a dependent variable. Consequently of capture, no individuals crossing the wildlife bridge, striped field mouse use the wildlife bridge as a habitat.The environmental factors affecting the use of mice were vegetation cover(1~2m, 2~8m, over 8m), vegetation construction, maximum diameter at breast height were positively correlated and slope was nagatively correlated. In conclusion, it is expected that the effectiveness of the wildlife bridge will be further improved by planting shrubs and trees and preventing high slope and cut slope increasing the utilization of the rat, such as being used as a food source in the ecosystem.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.340-344
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• 2006

The objective of this paper was to investigate the potential of road-crossing structures as biological corridors that can overcome wildlife habitat fragmentation caused by road construction. Snow tracking on animal trace adjacent to and under bridges, underpasses, and culverts of eight rural highways in Korea was carried out. A total 89 structures were monitored and the results follow. First, the probability of road crossing increases with the increasing cross sectional size of crossing structures. Second, small to medium sized carnivores such as raccoon dog, leopard cat, and Siberian weasel use all types of structures. Finally, water deer, or large herbivore crossed only under bridges. Consequently, further studies are necessary to identify suitable types of road crossing structures that can mitigate the probability of road-kills and habitat fragmentation of water deer.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.1-14
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• 2016

With the continuous expansion of highway network and its traffics, neighboring wildlife habitats are splitted into smaller and more isolated patches. The infrastructures contribute to the wildlife-vehicle collision by creating barriers to animal movement. This kinds of traffic accidents are dangerous factors to the drivers' safety and the facilities on the highway as well as to the wildlife themselves. One of the most common ways to prevent habitat fragmentation are fauna crossings and fences. The cost of the mitigation measures to prevent wildlife-vehicle collision could be monetized. However their economic benefits are difficult to be measured. Using contingent valuation method, this study tries to estimate the economic valuation of wildlife collision prevention projects on the Korean highways. The result shows that 43.88% of Korean household had the positive willingness pay to the projects. Moreover, we found that the recognition of the project or the favourable attitude to the environmental issues could raise the willingness-to-pay. Therefore, active public relation on the project could make the friendly public opinion and increase the number of the household which has the positive willingness-to-pay on the project.