Brasilia, Sept 14 (Prensa Latina) At least 17 million vertebrate animals were killed in the fires in the Pantanal, a biodiversity paradise in Brazil, in 2020, a study revealed, cited on Tuesday by the G1 news portal.
Conducted by 30 researchers from public institutions, universities and non-governmental organizations, the study counted the bodies of animals and created a mathematical model to estimate the destruction caused by the fire in the biome.
The most common victims were small snakes, mainly water ones: more than nine million deaths.
The researchers claim that this study is pioneer in the use of the ‘line remote sampling technique’ to calculate fire expirations.
This methodology is based on the so-called transects: straight line trails through areas predetermined by foci in the biome.
Each line traversed ranged from 500 meters to 3 kilometers. In total, the group traveled 114 kilometers of transects.
G1 indicated that 17 million vertebrates is an underestimation, because many of those that live in dens or inside tree holes may have died in these places without being seen.
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