Result
Effects of anthropic and climatic factors
Through spatial-temporal GAM analysis, we found that population and temperature had significantly positive correlations with the local extinctions of Chinese pangolin in 1700-2000 across China (Table 1). The extinction probability of the Chinese pangolin increased with increasing temperature and total population growth (Fig. 1). In addition, geographic distribution was also associated with local extinctions, and Chinese pangolins were more likely to go extinct at high longitudes and latitudes in China (Fig. 1). However, the effects of population density, cropland, grazing and regional temperature on local extinctions of Chinese pangolin were not detected through this method (Table 1). The opinion that climate change and human interference affected the survival and geographical distribution of Chinese pangolins was confirmed. However, we could still not determine which variable played a pivotal role in local extinctions of Chinese pangolin according to the regression models. Total population and average temperature of China both present increasing trends. The difference is the temperature are much more fluctuant (Fig.S1, Fig.S2).