Preserving Madagascar Wildlife Is Her Passion
Sarah Karpanty, an assistant professor in the Department of Fisheries and Wildlife Science, has a dream. She wants to see Madagascar areas destroyed by logging reforested, and natural habitats for lemurs and other wildlife she studies restored.
Karpanty is no stranger to the island, off the southeastern coast of Africa. She first visited the country as an undergraduate, where she met the famous conservationist, anthropologist, and lemur expert Patricia Wright. She later returned to Madagascar to study under Wright’s tutelage as a graduate student.
The red fronted lemur is one of
many animal species Karpanty
works with in Madagascar.
Today Karpanty studies predation; the primary animals she observes are lemurs, fossas, and avian raptors such as hawks and eagles. A main focus is to learn “how natural predation processes may influence the long-term conservation of endangered lemurs in the highly fragmented forests of Madagascar.”
One of the focal points of Karpanty’s research involves territory. She studies the size of the animals’ hunting ranges and how much ground they cover daily. She also examines how territory size impacts the populations of the predators and their prey.
Karpanty also spends her time in Madagascar on a related project. Due to logging of Madagascar’s rain forests, many animals have had their habitats reduced. In 2000, Karpanty began working on an idea for a reforestation project that would plant new trees and rebuild the lost habitats. Wright helped her raise money for the project.
Karpanty’s plan starts with educating local communities in Madagascar about the necessity of replenishing and restoring the forest. She then would demonstrate how they could plant and care for new trees. Karpanty’s wish is that one day she will be able to scale this project up so that people will support it across the nation.
Last fall the professor took her first student, Charles “Chaz” Crawford, to Madagascar with her. They did a pilot study that trapped animals to determine population density. Karpanty hopes to have a full-scale study abroad program running in Madagascar by 2009.
11/25/08