Community Awareness and Evidence of Dugong ( Dugong dugon ) Presence in Anjouan, Comoros

ABSTRACT

The dugong ( Dugong dugon ), listed as Vulnerable globally, is poorly documented in the Western Indian Ocean, including the Comoros. We combined Local Ecological Knowledge (LEK) and Passive Acoustic Monitoring (PAM) to assess occurrence and reported encounters around the island of Anjouan. We conducted 180 questionnaire‐based interviews with artisanal fishers in 18 villages inside or outside the Shisiwani National Park (SNP; July–September 2024). An Autonomous Recording Unit was concurrently deployed (April–September 2024) in SNP waters with a 16.7% duty cycle. Overall, 62.2% of respondents reported knowing of dugongs and 43.9% reported a lifetime sighting. Respondents in villages inside SNP more often reported lifetime sightings (56.4%), whereas, among respondents with a lifetime sighting and temporal information, those in villages outside SNP more often reported a sighting during the previous year (29.4%). Reports varied among age groups and were highest among respondents older than 55 years. Among respondents with valid capture information, 53.6% inside SNP and 23.7% outside SNP reported having captured a dugong or witnessed a capture. PAM detected 18 recordings including signals acoustically consistent with published descriptions of dugong vocalizations: 16 chirps, one squeak, and one quack. These findings support community‐based mitigation and expanded monitoring around Anjouan.