Journal of Wildlife Management最新文献

{"title":"Behavioral and demographic response of small Indian mongooses (Urva auropunctata) to experimental population reduction","authors":"Caroline C. Sauvé,&nbsp;Are R. Berentsen,&nbsp;Amy T. Gilbert,&nbsp;Anne Conan,&nbsp;Patrick A. Leighton","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22724","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22724","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The small Indian mongoose (<i>Urva auropunctata</i>) is a non-native invasive species throughout the Caribbean and the primary terrestrial wildlife rabies reservoir on 4 islands in the region. In the 1970s and 1980s, island-wide attempts to control and eliminate mongoose rabies through culling or poisoning in Cuba and Grenada proved unsuccessful. On some islands, localized population reduction of mongooses is used to mitigate predation on endangered species or to reduce the nuisance and frequency of interactions with humans. However, the short- and medium-term demographic responses of mongooses to local population reduction and the impacts for infectious disease transmission remain unexplored. We conducted an experimental removal of mongooses across a 0.42-km² area of dry forest in St. Kitts. Employing capture-mark-recapture techniques, we quantified the demographic and behavioral responses of mongooses within the study area. We collected individual-level data using an automated radio-telemetry system, monitoring the daily presence of 19 collared mongooses for 7 months before and up to 7 weeks after experimental removals. The mongoose population density rebounded to pre-removal levels within 7 weeks of the removal, primarily because of the influx of reproductively active females. The proportion of juveniles increased from 1–3% before removals to 14% at 7 weeks after removals yet returned to baseline levels at 6 months after removals. The local immigration of mongooses to the site was evident through changes in capture per unit effort, observed as early as the first week after removals. Tagged mongooses that frequented the study area during the pre-removal period increased their daily presence for 5–30 days after removals. Our results indicate that a localized and intensive mongoose removal program targeting a high-density population has short-term but not long-term residual impacts to the population. Further investigation into contact rates among mongooses and space use among resident and immigrating individuals is essential to advance our understanding of the impacts of localized removals on short- and long-term mongoose population disease dynamics.</p>","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2025-01-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143595575","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Issue Information - Cover","authors":"","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22603","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22603","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2025-01-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/jwmg.22603","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143115564","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"African elephants influence browse availability for black rhinoceroses in Gonarezhou National Park, Zimbabwe","authors":"Marileen van der Westhuizen,&nbsp;Bruce Clegg,&nbsp;Vernon Visser,&nbsp;Tim O'Connor","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22718","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22718","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Translocations are essential for the establishment of new populations of the critically endangered black rhinoceros (<i>Diceros bicornis</i>), but success will largely depend on forage availability. We investigated the degree of competition for woody browse between African savanna elephants (<i>Loxodonta africana</i>) and a recently reintroduced population of rhinoceroses in Gonarezhou National Park in Zimbabwe in the dry season of 2022. We examined overlap in space use and selection for plant species, stem diameters, and feeding height by measuring use of shrubs by both species at 75 sites across a range of topo-edaphic conditions. Areas heavily used by rhinoceroses had high shrub densities, were close to water, and were on alkaline soils with elevated conductivity. Sites with medium to high levels of rhinoceros use were nested within areas of high elephant use. We also observed high elephant use in areas not favored by rhinoceroses, occurring farther from water and having lower shrub densities. Both species avoided thickets on acidic soils. There was substantial overlap in feeding areas, the plant species selected, and foraging height, although elephants used stems with larger diameters than rhinoceroses. Feeding by elephants on woody plants often resulted in a proliferation of small-diameter coppice stems, which rhinoceroses used more than non-coppice growth. Elephants did not appear to favor small coppice stems, indicating a degree of elephant-induced facilitation of browse for rhinoceroses. Evidence for competition with elephants indicates black rhinoceroses may be best introduced into areas with a low elephant density.</p>","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2025-01-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/jwmg.22718","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143595510","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"JWM beyond the Journal Impact Factor","authors":"Jacqueline L. Frair","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22723","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22723","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt;In the era of the Impact Agenda, pressure is mounting to demonstrate the value of research beyond its impact on other researchers (Thelwall &lt;span&gt;2021&lt;/span&gt;). As a complement to scientific impact factors, so-called alternative metrics or Altmetrics attempt to gauge societal attention to published research articles by tracking digital mentions within news outlets, blogs, Wikipedia entries, policy documents, social media feeds (e.g., X, Reddit, Facebook), and reference managers like Mendeley (Williams &lt;span&gt;2017&lt;/span&gt;, Javed Ali &lt;span&gt;2021&lt;/span&gt;). Major platforms like Altmetrics or PlumX calculate an integrated attention score that weights the volume of mentions by the importance or authority of their sources (Javed Ali &lt;span&gt;2021&lt;/span&gt;). Studies have demonstrated that alternative metrics operate in a different orthogonal dimension than citation-based metrics (Bornmann and Haunschild &lt;span&gt;2018&lt;/span&gt;), and if the latter captures research quality the former captures public interest irrespective of quality. Like any metric, attention scores have limitations—among other concerns Altmetrics could be easily manipulated by social media platforms, some topics are inherently more interesting to people than others irrespective of their value to society, geographic and language biases are apparent, sensational claims or topics are likely to receive more attention than serious academic research, and the nature of the attention (positive or negative) is not captured (Patthi et al. &lt;span&gt;2017&lt;/span&gt;, Williams &lt;span&gt;2017&lt;/span&gt;, Javed Ali &lt;span&gt;2021&lt;/span&gt;). The field of alternative metrics is new and rapidly evolving. Most scholars advise that Altmetrics should be considered complementary to traditional impact metrics while maintaining a healthy degree of skepticism (García-Villar &lt;span&gt;2021&lt;/span&gt;, Thelwall &lt;span&gt;2021&lt;/span&gt;).&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;With full access to Altmetrics.com being provided to me by Wiley, I conducted a search on 6 December 2024 for the &lt;i&gt;Journal of Wildlife Management&lt;/i&gt; (&lt;i&gt;JWM&lt;/i&gt;; no specified date range) to identify the top 10 most highly scored papers and see what characteristics they might share (Table 1). One advantage of Altmetrics is that they can gauge immediate social interest, whereas peer-reviewed citations can take years to materialize. One top 10 paper was published 13 years ago, 3 were published 6-7 years ago, 3 were published 3-4 years ago, and 3 were published in the last 2 years. Only 30% of these articles were published Open Access (Hanley et al. &lt;span&gt;2022&lt;/span&gt;, Ramey et al. &lt;span&gt;2022&lt;/span&gt;, Wightman et al. &lt;span&gt;2024&lt;/span&gt;). Of the 10 lead authors, 40% were female.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;In terms of content, 7 were original research articles, 2 were review articles, and 1 was an Editor's note introducing a special section. Several of the top 10 articles focused on health issues (e.g., lead poisoning, avian influenza) or received press coverage because of the risk of a spillover health issue (e.g., deadly herpes virus in macaques). ","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2025-01-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/jwmg.22723","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143113727","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"North American river otter habitat suitability and human–wildlife coexistence on Protection Island, British Columbia, Canada","authors":"Caroline L. Lesage,&nbsp;Angela Kross,&nbsp;Sarah E. Turner","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22719","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22719","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Land use change and urban sprawl increase the likelihood of encounters between humans and wildlife. North American river otters (<i>Lontra canadensis</i>) coexist (and also conflict) with humans in many places, including on Protection Island, British Columbia, Canada. River otters are sensitive to, yet also inhabit, environments with relatively high levels of anthropogenic disturbance. From June to November 2022, we investigated the effect of anthropogenic factors on river otter use of space and behavior. We modeled the relative importance of anthropogenic (e.g., distance to buildings and roads, level of human use of docks), environmental (e.g., land cover type), and topographic (elevation) variables for habitat suitability in wild river otters on Protection Island using maximum entropy (MaxEnt) species distribution models, from 660 occurrence points collected. We conducted 178 behavioral scan samples (containing 594 observations) from direct-observation video and motion-triggered trail camera video to evaluate behavioral differences associated with the use of an anthropogenic habitat feature, docks (a potential attractant), and land. We found that the most suitable areas for river otters in this study were near docks (at all levels of human use), near water or wetlands (within ~25 m of the water), and had intermediate densities of driftwood. Further, our findings indicated that human activities generally did not impede otter use of space — river otters and humans were able to coexist in this semi-urban context. Behaviors on docks differed from behaviors on land, and river otters used docks more than would be expected by chance overall, and specifically overnight, and used docks for individual and social activities. Our case study suggests that anthropogenic and environmental factors are key habitat suitability predictors for river otters, and that in populations habituated to human presence, docks may act as a habitat attractant. This case can inform conservation and management practices for river otters, other flagship species, and the ecosystems they inhabit, enhancing human–wildlife coexistence in anthropogenic landscapes.</p>","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2025-01-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/jwmg.22719","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143594848","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Soil quality does not predict plant nutrition available to white-tailed deer","authors":"Craig A. Harper,&nbsp;Bronson K. Strickland,&nbsp;Marcus A. Lashley,&nbsp;Mark A. Turner,&nbsp;Jordan S. Nanney,&nbsp;M. Colter Chitwood,&nbsp;Christopher E. Moorman,&nbsp;Natasha Ellison-Neary,&nbsp;Jarred M. Brooke,&nbsp;Garrett M. Street","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22722","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22722","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt;Morphometric variation of white-tailed deer (&lt;i&gt;Odocoileus virginianus&lt;/i&gt;; hereafter, deer) is caused by multiple environmental factors, including temperature, precipitation, soil quality, and forage availability. The effects of temperature and precipitation on plant growth are well documented, but it is unclear how soil mineral concentration affects deer morphometrics. Although it is recognized that deer have larger morphology and greater productivity in areas of the United States with mineral-rich soils, the question remains as to whether this trend is driven by increased food availability in areas with mineral-rich soils because of land use (i.e., agriculture) or if nutrient concentration of plants is greater in soils with greater mineral concentration. We collected plant tissue from 40 species commonly selected as forage by deer at 36 sites in 16 states across the eastern United States, representing a wide range of soil quality conditions over a broad geographical area. We categorized plant sampling locations into 5 soil quality classes based on a soil productivity index and analyzed plant nutrients to assess if soil productivity index classifications could be used to predict deer forage quality. We then made direct soil-plant comparisons by pairing each plant sample with a soil sample collected around the base of the plant to determine if soil nutrient concentration explained variation in plant nutrient concentration. We tested soil samples for phosphorus, potassium, and calcium. We analyzed plant samples for crude protein, phosphorus, potassium, and calcium for the soil productivity classification comparisons, and we analyzed phosphorus, potassium, and calcium for the direct site-specific analyses, as these macronutrients are critical to deer body mass, productivity, and antler growth. We analyzed forages by plant type (i.e., forb, semi-woody, shrub, or tree) and plant tissue age (i.e., young or older tissue). Nutrient concentration varied by plant type and tissue age. Plant type explained the majority of variation in plant nutrients, with forbs containing greater concentrations of all nutrients than the other plant types. Young plant material contained more crude protein and phosphorus, whereas older plant material contained more calcium. The soil productivity index was a poor predictor of deer forage quality. Calcium was the only mineral that differed by soil productivity class, but calcium was not limiting for deer at any site, as plant calcium levels exceeded maximum requirements for deer across all soil productivity classes. Site-specific soil phosphorus, potassium, and calcium explained little variation in plant mineral concentration (partial &lt;i&gt;R&lt;/i&gt;&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; = 0.00). Our results provide evidence that naturally occurring plants, especially forbs, can provide nutrition sufficient for maximum deer body weight, reproduction, and antler size, within a given area, across the eastern United States regardless of the dominant soil typ","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2025-01-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143594849","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Effects of maternal condition, disease status, and behavior on survival of juvenile bighorn sheep","authors":"Nicole M. Bilodeau-Hussey,&nbsp;Katey S. Huggler,&nbsp;E. Frances Cassirer,&nbsp;Hollie Miyasaki,&nbsp;Mark A. Hurley,&nbsp;Lisa A. Shipley,&nbsp;Ryan A. Long","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22721","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22721","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Nutrition integrates and interacts with a variety of biotic and abiotic factors that modulate performance of large-herbivore populations. Accordingly, studying patterns of herbivore performance through the lens of nutrition can shed light on the complex mechanisms that drive population dynamics. We studied bighorn sheep (<i>Ovis canadensis</i>) and their habitat and quantified relationships among 1) the foodscape (defined herein as spatiotemporal variation in the quality and availability of forage plants); 2) female behavior (i.e., use of the foodscape and rugged escape terrain), condition (% ingesta-free body fat), and disease status (infection status and antibody levels); and 3) juvenile survival. We conducted intensive vegetation sampling and used generalized additive modeling to map the foodscapes available to bighorn sheep during summer (May–September) over 2 years in 2 population ranges in Idaho, USA: the East Fork of the Salmon River and the Lost River Range. In each study area, we used global positioning system (GPS) collars and field observations to monitor adult female behavior and lamb survival, quantified nutritional condition and disease status of maternal females in late winter, and used known-fate survival modeling to test for effects of female traits and behavior on lamb survival. Adjusted <i>R</i>² values for foodscape models ranged from 0.34 to 0.61. Collared females consistently selected rugged escape terrain in both study areas, but we found little evidence of selection for the foodscape. We did not detect any consistent effects of maternal space-use behavior on lamb survival. In contrast, nutritional condition of females in late winter had a strong, positive effect on summer lamb survival: lambs born to females in relatively good condition (15% ingesta-free body fat, ~94% probability of lamb survival) were roughly 4 times more likely to survive the summer months than lambs born to females in poor condition (5% ingesta-free body fat, ~25% probability of lamb survival). In addition, whereas maternal infection with the pathogen <i>Mycoplasma ovipneumoniae</i> had no discernable effect on juvenile survival, lambs born to females that showed no sign of exposure (antibody) to <i>M. ovipneumoniae</i> (~99% probability of survival) were roughly 3 times more likely to survive the summer than lambs born to females that had mounted a strong immune response (35% probability of survival). Our work adds to a growing body of literature linking nutritional condition to juvenile survival and other key vital rates, and highlights the importance of efforts to better understand the role of nutrition in the context of disease and other factors limiting performance of herbivore populations.</p>","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2025-01-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143594789","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Photo survey estimates of annual recruitment in eastern North American sea duck populations","authors":"Jacob E. Hewitt,&nbsp;Anthony J. Roberts,&nbsp;Kelsey M. Sullivan,&nbsp;Jacob N. Straub","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22714","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22714","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Sea duck (tribe <i>mergini</i>) populations have experienced significant declines in recent years, though underlying causes are poorly understood. Information on population demographic parameters may provide insight for wildlife managers seeking to maintain sustainable harvest. However, population monitoring capacity for sea ducks is limited relative to other waterfowl species because of their remote breeding distribution. The United States Fish and Wildlife Service organizes a Parts Collection Survey (PCS), which estimates recruitment in sea duck populations using age ratios (juveniles/adult), though estimates are biased because harvest vulnerability differs between age cohorts. We used a photo survey to calculate estimates of annual recruitment for long-tailed duck (<i>Clangula hyemalis</i>), black scoter (<i>Melanitta americana</i>), surf scoter (<i>M. perspicillata</i>), and white-winged scoter (<i>M. deglandi</i>; hereafter sea ducks) populations in eastern North America. Our team of surveyors collected photos of flighted sea ducks from shore and by boat in 11 states and 1 province from 15 October–15 December annually in 2019–2022. We classified photographed birds according to age and sex and calculated juvenile proportions of each species using a Bayesian binomial model. To compare photo survey estimates with PCS estimates, we used a paired <i>t</i>-test organized by year. We found strong evidence that PCS estimates of juvenile proportions were greater than photo survey estimates for 3 sea duck species, indicating a consistent positive bias in PCS driven by harvest vulnerability. We also derived novel estimates of juvenile harvest vulnerability using the mean difference between within-year estimates. Our work demonstrated the photo survey methodology produced annual recruitment estimates for 4 poorly monitored waterfowl populations with greater sample sizes and reduced systematic biases relative to existing methods; we recommend managers continue to adopt this approach in future years with additional consideration given for spatial representation and refinement of image classification procedures for long-tailed duck estimates.</p>","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2024-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143595460","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Increasing Safe Harbor Agreement enrollment: a choice experiment approach to investigate preferred contract attributes","authors":"Elena C. Rubino,&nbsp;Jared A. Messick,&nbsp;Christopher Serenari","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22716","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22716","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Safe Harbor Agreements (SHAs) are one of the voluntary incentive programs designed to neutralize some of the costs and burdens associated with endangered species protection on private lands under the Endangered Species Act. They have demonstrated mixed success in terms of landowner participation, indicating that merely offering an SHA is not enough to persuade landowners to enter into agreements with government entities to protect endangered species. Yet little research has investigated landowner decision-making and the programmatic structures that influence participation in SHAs. In this study, we employed hypothetical choice experiment offerings of Houston toad (<i>Bufo houstonensis</i>) SHAs to explore the reasoning behind Texas landowners' (<i>n</i> = 956) willingness to participate in the program, and to reveal programmatic characteristics most appealing to landowners. Respondents were most frequently willing to enroll in an SHA because of beliefs about and a sense of responsibility towards conserving nature, and were unwilling to potentially enroll in an SHA because they did not know enough about SHAs, did not want the government involved in their land management, and did not want to enter a binding agreement regarding endangered species. Additionally, respondents were more likely to enroll in hypothetical SHAs if the agreements included 10-year contract durations and full future assurances, and less likely to enroll if they included 30-year contract durations. This study provides program administrators with insights into how to improve the design and delivery of SHAs to increase participation among private landowners.</p>","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2024-12-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143595456","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Temporal and interspecific comparisons reveal shifts in the distributions of two Florida skunk species","authors":"Darcy Doran-Myers,&nbsp;Mike N. Gillikin,&nbsp;Mark A. Barrett,&nbsp;Kristen Nelson Sella,&nbsp;Ricardo Zambrano,&nbsp;Megan Wallrichs,&nbsp;Terry J. Doonan,&nbsp;Elizabeth C. Braun de Torrez","doi":"10.1002/jwmg.22717","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.22717","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Understanding the distribution of wildlife species is key to their effective conservation and management. Comparing distributions of similar species can provide valuable insights regarding range overlap and how overlap changes over time. We estimated the geographic distributions of 2 skunk species, the eastern spotted skunk (<i>Spilogale putorius</i>) and the striped skunk (<i>Mephitis mephitis</i>), in Florida, USA, for historical (1997–2002) and contemporary (2017–2022) periods using opportunistic presence data (e.g., public sightings, camera trap records, live trap records). For each species, we produced range models at 2 levels: a generalized boundary (range extent) using a concave hull and a more detailed delineation (occupied range) using kernel density estimation. We expected spotted skunk range to decline (as it has elsewhere), striped skunk range to remain stable, and both species' ranges to have a relatively high geographic overlap. The contemporary models show spotted skunk range encompassing 26% of Florida land area, primarily in southern and coastal Florida, and striped skunk range encompassing 55% of Florida land area, primarily in northern and interior Florida. Range size for spotted skunk declined by approximately 30% between periods, although range expansion occurred in some localized areas. Range size for striped skunk was stable over time, with some localized contractions and expansions. Considerable temporal shifts occurred in skunk distribution, where only 34% of spotted skunk and 54% of striped skunk occupied range remained spatially constant between periods. Divergent geographic use between the 2 species increased over time, yielding a low range overlap of 23% between their contemporary occupied ranges. Our study fills a spatial data gap in skunk research, can inform state- or species-level conservation decisions for spotted skunk, and supports the need for further research on habitat requirements of skunks in Florida.</p>","PeriodicalId":17504,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Wildlife Management","volume":"89 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2024-12-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143595455","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}