THE HUNTING OF TAPIR (Tapirus terrestris) AND THE IMPLICATIONS FOR THE CONSERVATION OF BRAZILIAN FORESTS: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

Abstract

This article aimed to record the main Brazilian regions where the tapir is under pressure from hunting and to list the main families of plants dispersed by Tapirus terrestris in Brazil and to verify the possible effects of hunting on seed dispersal by this species. For this, we made a bibliographic survey of scientific articles available in the Google Scholar database, in a range from 2005 to 2019. We found a total of 36 works related to hunting and only six focused on seed dispersal by the tapir. The publications, mainly hunting, are concentrated in the northern region of Brazil, but we also found studies for the South, Southeast, Midwest and Northeast. We surveyed a total of 139 species of plants scattered by the tapir, and Melastomataceae was the richest family. Our results indicate that the main threats to tapirs are habitat fragmentation and hunting, but trade and cultural issues such as the use of by-products in traditional medicine can also pose major risks to this species.