Managed relocation: Addressing the nexus of climate change, invasive species, and fish and wildlife health
No abstract available.
Report↗
Geology topics
Tiffany Wolf
Publications and source records attributed to Tiffany Wolf.
The influence of human presence and footprint on animal space use in US national parks
Given the importance of protected areas for biodiversity, the growth of visitation to many areas has raised concerns about the effects of humans on wildlife. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic led to temporary closure of national parks in the United States, offering a pseudonatural experiment to tease apart the effects of permanent infrastructure and transient human presence on animals. We compiled GPS tracking data from 229 individuals of 10 mammal species in 14 parks and used third-order hierarchical resource selection functions to evaluate the influence of the human footprint on animal space use in 2019 and 2020. Averaged across all parks and species, animals avoided the human footprint, whether the park was open or closed. However, although animals in remote areas showed consistent avoidance, on average those in more developed areas switched from avoidance to selection when protected areas were closed. Findings varied across species: some responded consistently negatively to the footprint (wolves, mountain goats), some positively (mule deer, red fox) and others had a strong exposure-mediated response (elk, mountain lion). Furthermore, some species responded more strongly to the park closure (black bear, moose). This study advances our understanding of complex interactions between recreation and wildlife in protected areas.
western United States↗
Do transmitters affect survival and body condition of American beavers Castor canadensis ?
One key assumption often inferred with using radio-equipped individuals is that the transmitter has no effect on the metric of interest. To evaluate this assumption, we used a known fate model to assess the effect of transmitter type (i.e. tail-mounted or peritoneal implant) on short-term (one year) survival and a joint live—dead recovery model and results from a mark—recapture study to compare long-term (eight years) survival and body condition of ear-tagged only American beavers Castor canadensis to those equipped with radio transmitters in Voyageurs National Park, Minnesota, USA. Short-term (1-year) survival was not influenced by transmitter type ( w i = 0.64). Over the 8-year study period, annual survival was similar between transmitter-equipped beavers (tail-mounted and implant transmitters combined; 0.76; 95% CI = 0.45–0.91) versus ear-tagged only (0.78; 95% CI = 0.45–0.93). Additionally, we found no difference in weight gain (t 9 = 0.25, p = 0.80) or tail area ( t 11 = 1.25, p = 0.24) from spring to summer between the two groups. In contrast, winter weight loss (t 22 = - 2.03, p = 0.05) and tail area decrease ( t 30 = - 3.04, p = 0.01) was greater for transmitterequipped (weight = - 3.09 kg, SE = 0.55; tail area = - 33.71 cm 2 , SE = 4.80) than ear-tagged only (weight = - 1.80 kg, SE = 0.33; tail area = - 12.38 cm 2 , SE = 5.13) beavers. Our results generally support the continued use of transmitters on beavers for estimating demographic parameters, although we recommend additional assessments of transmitter effects under different environmental conditions.
Wildlife Biology↗