Participatory methods for the assessment of the ownership status of free-roaming dogs in Bali, Indonesia, for disease control and animal welfare

- The existence of healthy unowned, free-roaming dogs has serious implications for disease control and animal welfare.
- We used participatory methods (PRA) to infer the existence (or not) of a resident population of healthy, unowned dogs in two villages in Bali.
- PRA was used as a novel alternative to mark-recapture methods previously used to evaluate the fraction of unowned dogs in a population.
- The PRA results confirmed that a population of free-roaming dogs sustained independently of direct human support was unlikely to exist.

The existence of unowned, free-roaming dogs capable of maintaining adequate body condition without direct human oversight has serious implications for disease control and animal welfare, including reducing effective vaccination coverage against rabies through limiting access for vaccination, and absolving humans from the responsibility of providing adequate care for a domesticated species. Mark-recapture methods previously used to estimate the fraction of unowned dogs in free-roaming populations have limitations, particularly when most of the dogs are owned. We used participatory methods, described as Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA), as a novel alternative to mark-recapture methods in two villages in Bali, Indonesia. PRA was implemented at the banjar (or sub-village)-level to obtain consensus on the food sources of the free-roaming dogs. Specific methods included semi-structured discussion, visualisation tools and ranking. The PRA results agreed with the preceding household surveys and direct observations, designed to evaluate the same variables, and confirmed that a population of unowned, free-roaming dogs in sufficiently good condition to be sustained independently of direct human support was unlikely to exist.