Data from: Impact of wild prey availability on livestock predation by snow leopards

An increasing proportion of the world's poor is rearing livestock
today, and the global livestock population is growing. Livestock predation
by large carnivores and their retaliatory killing is becoming an economic
and conservation concern. A common recommendation for carnivore
conservation and for reducing predation on livestock is to increase wild
prey populations based on the assumption that the carnivores will consume
this alternative food. Livestock predation, however, could either reduce
or intensify with increases in wild prey depending on prey choice and
trends in carnivore abundance. We show that the extent of livestock
predation by the endangered snow leopard Panthera uncia intensifies with
increases in the density of wild ungulate prey, and subsequently
stabilizes. We found that snow leopard density, estimated at seven sites,
was a positive linear function of the density of wild ungulates—the
preferred prey—and showed no discernible relationship with livestock
density. We also found that modelled livestock predation increased with
livestock density. Our results suggest that snow leopard conservation
would benefit from an increase in wild ungulates, but that would intensify
the problem of livestock predation for pastoralists. The potential
benefits of increased wild prey abundance in reducing livestock predation
can be overwhelmed by a resultant increase in snow leopard populations.
Snow leopard conservation efforts aimed at facilitating increases in wild
prey must be accompanied by greater assistance for better livestock
protection and offsetting the economic damage caused by carnivores.