Optimum sustainable population estimation of Rusa timorensis in Pananjung Pangandaran nature reserve and natural park

Three main objectives of conservation are protection, preservation and sustainable utilization. Timor deer is one of Indonesian wild animal that has many benefits and high economic value. But the current Timor deer population continues to decrease with population decline rate of 10% in each generation. It caused by harvesting without considering sustainability. Therefore it is necessary to manage the population for Timor deer, so it can be available for sustainable use. Optimum sustainable population is a threshold population size for sustainable harvesting. The purpose of this study is to estimate the optimum sustainable population size so Timor deer can be utilized sustainably in the future. The method used was projecting the actual population by using Leslie matrix (Density Dependence) so that population growth can be seen. The optimum sustainable population is the size of the population with the highest growth rate. The time used for this population projection is 100 years. Based on the results of this research, the optimum sustainable population size for Timor deer in the Pananjung Pangandaran nature reserve and Natural Park is 751 individuals and the optimum sustainable population size will be achieved in 2047.