Distribution of Population and Habitat Characteristics of Long-tailed macaques in Gunung Merapi National Park

Abstract

Long-tailed macaque (Macaca fascicularis) is a widely distributed primate species which experiencing rapid population decline due to habitat loss and degradation, pharmaceutical usage and conflicts with human. Many researches regarding this species has been carried out, but not a particular topic on how volcanic eruptions affected its habitat. Gunung Merapi, a volcano located in Yogyakarta Province and was known as long-tailed macaque habitat, erupted in 2010 and made a massive destruction to the forest ecosystem. This research was aimed to identify the distribution of population, habitat characteristic and the correlation of habitat components to the existence of this monkey in Gunung Merapi forest ecosystem after the eruption took place. Spatial analysis was used to describe the distribution of population, while habitat characteristic was identified using vegetation analysis followed by chi square test. The result showed that 5 groups of this macaque were found spreading in 5 resorts of Gunung Merapi of which these regions were classified as slightly-damaged and moderately-damaged habitat. As for the diversity of plant species, an amount of 85 species was able to be identified and these species were found at the slightly-damaged and moderately-damaged habitats within a group of 82 and 29 species respectively. Of all these species only 21 and 11 species in each group were identified as the macaques’ diet. The result of Chi square test suggested a significant correlation between the existence of long-tailed macaque with habitat components of altitude, temperature, humidity, distance to farm, distance to water, plant species for diet, the number of vegetation species, and vegetation density (seedlings, saplings and trees).