High life satisfaction reported among small-scale societies with low incomes.

Global polls have shown that people in high-income countries generally report being more satisfied with their lives than people in low-income countries. The persistence of this correlation, and its similarity to correlations between income and life satisfaction within countries, could lead to the impression that high levels of life satisfaction can only be achieved in wealthy societies. However, global polls have typically overlooked small-scale, nonindustrialized societies, which can provide an alternative test of the consistency of this relationship.

Communicating conservation: how do the Nepalese print media portray caterpillar fungus? An analysis of newspaper coverage from 2008-2021.

Caterpillar fungus () makes an economically important contribution to livelihoods of the local people in the Himalaya. Its extraordinarily high market price as an aphrodisiac, and pressure in the natural habitats due to overharvesting and climate change, have attracted local and global media attentions. Despite the wide media coverage on various social and environmental aspects of the caterpillar fungus, a consolidated analysis of the news and featured articles about the different dimensions of the caterpillar fungus is lacking.

Impact of Climate Change on Health and Well-Being of People in Hindu Kush Himalayan Region: A Narrative Review.

Climate change and variability affect virtually everyone and every region of the world but the effects are nowhere more prominent than in mountain regions and people living therein. The Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region is a vast expanse encompassing 18% of the world's mountainous area. Sprawling over 4.

Checklist of the grasses of India.

A checklist of the grasses of India is presented, as compiled from survey of all available literature. Of the twelve subfamilies of grasses, ten are represented in India. Most subfamilies have been examined by taxonomic experts for up-to-date nomenclature.

The diet of the striped hyena in Nepal's lowland regions.

Striped hyenas () are extremely rare in Nepal, and only a few people have studied them in their natural forest and grassland habitat. Their rarity is due to anthropogenic pressures such as hunting, habitat modification, being killed on roads, and depletion of their natural prey. Here, we studied the feeding ecology of hyenas in lowland, Nepal.

Decreasing brown bear () habitat due to climate change in Central Asia and the Asian Highlands.

Around the world, climate change has impacted many species. In this study, we used bioclimatic variables and biophysical layers of Central Asia and the Asian Highlands combined with presence data of brown bear () to understand their current distribution and predict their future distribution under the current rate of climate change. Our bioclimatic model showed that the current suitable habitat of brown bear encompasses 3,430,493 km in the study area, the majority of which (>65%) located in China.

Community perception and prioritization of invasive alien plants in Chitwan-Annapurna Landscape, Nepal.

The management of invasive species is a complex, yet an essential component of biodiversity conservation and environmental management for sustainable futures. Despite a well-established linkage between biological invasions and human activities, the social dimension of invasive species management is less explored as compared to the ecological aspects. In recent years, the active participation of local communities, such as assessing levels of awareness and the selection of targeted species prioritized by communities, has been considered as a crucial element for managing invasive species.

Predicting the distributions of predator (snow leopard) and prey (blue sheep) under climate change in the Himalaya.

Future climate change is likely to affect distributions of species, disrupt biotic interactions, and cause spatial incongruity of predator-prey habitats. Understanding the impacts of future climate change on species distribution will help in the formulation of conservation policies to reduce the risks of future biodiversity losses. Using a species distribution modeling approach by MaxEnt, we modeled current and future distributions of snow leopard (Panthera uncia) and its common prey, blue sheep (Pseudois nayaur), and observed the changes in niche overlap in the Nepal Himalaya.

Impact of climate change on potential distribution of Chinese caterpillar fungus (Ophiocordyceps sinensis) in Nepal Himalaya.

Climate change has already impacted ecosystems and species and substantial impacts of climate change in the future are expected. Species distribution modeling is widely used to map the current potential distribution of species as well as to model the impact of future climate change on distribution of species. Mapping current distribution is useful for conservation planning and understanding the change in distribution impacted by climate change is important for mitigation of future biodiversity losses.

Widespread climate change in the Himalayas and associated changes in local ecosystems.

Background: Climate change in the Himalayas, a biodiversity hotspot, home of many sacred landscapes, and the source of eight largest rivers of Asia, is likely to impact the well-being of ~20% of humanity. However, despite the extraordinary environmental, cultural, and socio-economic importance of the Himalayas, and despite their rapidly increasing ecological degradation, not much is known about actual changes in the two most critical climatic variables: temperature and rainfall. Nor do we know how changes in these parameters might impact the ecosystems including vegetation phenology.