Red pandas selected steeper slopes with high solar insolation in the premating season while they occupied elevated areas and preferred specific aspects in the cub-rearing season. For instance, geo-physical variables were influential in the premating and cub-rearing seasons while vegetation variables were important in all seasons other than premating. Human disturbances, especially road and cattle herding activities, affected habitat utilization throughout the year whereas other variables were important only during restricted periods. We found the combined effect of geo-physical, vegetation and disturbance variables resulted in differences in resource selection of red pandas and that the degree of response to these variables varied across seasons. Our analysis was based on a generalized-linear-mixed model. We equipped 10 red pandas with GPS collars in eastern Nepal in 2019 and monitored them for one year. We aimed to examine the effect of geo-physical, vegetation, and disturbance variables on fine-scale habitat selection of red pandas in one such landscape. Therefore information on resource use across spatial and temporal scales could enable informed-decision making with better conservation outcomes. Conservation of habitat specialists, like red pandas Ailurus fulgens, inhabiting such landscapes is challenging. Human dominated landscapes provide heterogeneous wildlife habitat. We also seek for cooperation in Nepal, Bhutan and China to aid in preparing for a comprehensive monitoring plan for the long-term conservation and management of red panda in trans-boundary landscapes. We demonstrate the structural-operational connectivity of corridors in KL-India that facilitated red panda movement in the past. In concurrence to the habitat suitability and landscape connectivity models, gene flow results supported a contemporary asymmetric movement of red panda by connecting KL-India in a crescent arc. The spatially explicit and non-explicit Bayesian clustering algorithms evident to exhibit population structuring and supported red panda populations to exist in meta-population frame work. We identified 24 unique individuals from 234 feces collected at nine microsatellite loci. The study found about 1,309.54 km2 area suitable for red panda in KL-India, of which 62.21% area fell under the Protected Area network. The present study demonstrates fine-scale spatial patterns of genetic variation and contemporary gene flow of red panda (Ailurus fulgens) populations with respect to landscape connectivity in Kangchenjunga Landscape (KL), India. Wildlife management in rapid changing landscapes requires critical planning through cross cutting networks, and understanding of landscape features, often affected by the anthropogenic activities.
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