Vegetation influences wolf fine-scale habitat selection and movement rate in a logged coastal rainforest.

Abstract

Vegetation and its modification by humans can shape wildlife habitat selection and movement. A better understanding of how wolves select and move through natural and human modified vegetative cover can be used to implement forest management that considers impacts on wolves and their prey. We analyzed fine-scale wolf habitat selection and movement in a coastal temperate rainforest (Prince of Wales Island, Alaska, USA) in relation to: (1) young (≤ 30 years) and old (> 30 years) logged areas, (2) continuous measures of vegetative cover (as estimated via LiDAR), and (3) distance to roads, using integrated step-selection analysis (iSSA). Wolves selected areas with less forest canopy and understory cover at the population level, although they switched to selecting understory when within logged forest stands. The continuous canopy and understory measures vary at a fine spatial scale and thus appear to better explain fine-scale wolf selection and movement than categorical landcover classes representing the age of logged stands. Wolf selection of young (≤ 30 years) and old (> 30 years) successional logged areas, and areas near roads, was mixed across individuals. All individual wolves avoided canopy cover, but varied in their selection of logged stands, understory, and roads. Similarly, there was variability in movement rate response across individual wolves, although at the population level wolves moved faster through old (> 30 years) logged areas and through areas with less understory vegetation. Open vegetation including that present recently after logging is selected by wolves, and facilitates wolf movement, but this effect may be ephemeral as vegetation undergoes succession.