Movement patters and spatial relationships

Home Range

the general area in which an animal lives,
characterized by repeated use

• Used for daily activities
• Contains the resources
required for survival and
reproduction

Why have a home
range?

Knowledge of:
- Forage patches or good hunting
grounds
- Safe places to rest
- Nesting or denning sites
- Other conspecifics – competitors or
mates
- Places with high predator densities or
predation risk
Information is power!

A key feature of
home ranges?

site fidelity

site fiidelity

repeated use of a small area,
generally to perform a specific behavior
• Travel corridors
• Den sites
• Hunting or foraging areas
• Social interactions

Can an animal have a home range but not high
site fidelity?

• Yes! (if we are talking small scales)
• Within a familiar range, animals can use
similar habitat types that allow for
efficient foraging, effective refuge use,
knowledge of predators/competitors

Are home
ranges static?

Annual shifts in home ranges

• season, weather, etc.

Determinants of home
range size

• Body mass: larger animals have larger home range (need more resources - carnivores need larger home range size. Less caloric variability in a landscape when comp. to herbivore. Marine mammals have greater home range size given body mass - but even same size its stilll bigger.
• Environment: Sens. to humans; large mammals tend to diss. first
• Diet

territory

very specific type of home range. the area of an animal’s home range that it defends from conspecifics

• Actively defended
• Contains resources an
animals wants to control and
restrict access to by others

space use from none to high

nomadic, home range, home range with core area, territorial

Territory
defense
• Defended by

• Direct conflict
• Communication (visual presence and
displays, scent marking,
vocalization)

by communication may be more
common because it is safer, and therefore
is selected for (in an evolutionary sense)

Territory defense: who defends a territory

• Individual
• Mating pair
• Family or communal group

what is the problem with the santa monica mountains and mtn lion

constrained space, territory is overlapping. may be result of death due to more competiton

• can change due to environmental, anthropogenic conditions

territory defense for mountain lions: who, how, and limiting resource

• Who? Individual males defend against
other males
• How? Scent marking and direct conflict
• Limiting resource? Breeding
opportunities

territory defense for beavers: who, how, and limiting resource

• Who? Mating pair
• How? Scent marking and direct conflict
• Limiting resource? Food & lodge sites

territory defense for chimpanzee: who, how, and limiting resource

• Who? Group defend against other
groups
• How? Boundary patrols
• Limiting resource? Food, breeding
opportunities

Territorial
behavior should
only arise if a
resource can
reasonably (and
economically) be
defended: mountain lion

Female home ranges are relatively stable and related to food availability,
denning habitat

Territorial
behavior should
only arise if a
resource can
reasonably (and
economically) be
defended: beaver

Lodge site availability is related to stream/pond and meadow
characteristics (e.g., surrounding willows for food and construction
materials)

Territorial
behavior should
only arise if a
resource can
reasonably (and
economically) be
defended: chimp.

Fruiting trees and other food resources are related to habitat type

How do home ranges help us
understand wildlife ecology (4)

 Selection for resources
• Where are animal home ranges relative to the landscape?
• How to animals preferentially use habitats within their home ranges?
 Area requirements
• How much space do animals need?
• Do their home ranges overlap or not (territoriality)?
 Energetics and behavior
• How much do animals move? Why? What is the cost of that movement?
 How resilient are animals to environmental change?
• Are the anchored to specific locations? Do they have access to a diversity
of habitat types?

Two major types of dispersal

• Natal dispersal – movement from range where born to
range where first reproduction occurs
• Breeding dispersal – movement to new range between
reproductive events

dispersal

avoidance of inbreeding and reducing local competition

Dispersal has 3 stages:

• Emigration – leave current range
• Dispersal can be genetically hardwired or condition dependent
• Sex ratio, habitat condition, body condition
• Transfer – movement through unfamiliar territory
• Difficult to measure because it is hard to differentiate between failed
attempts to disperse and test-drives
• Immigration – settlement into new range
• Involves habitat selection and social integration
• Dispersers may accept lower quality habitat to fit in

Migration

repeated movements between distinct, nonoverlapping ranges

Migration behavior is

a widespread phenomena across taxa to deal with seasonal
(and otherwise varying) environments
• Typically, the animals that exhibit migration behavior are highly mobile
• Aerial and marine migrants generally move farther than terrestrial migrants

A suitable or preferred ‘habitat’ is not a static condition for many animals

Why is migration important?

• Allows migrants to reach higher densities, or
persist at all!
• Increases growth, reproductive success, or survival
• Provides access to differential resources
required during different times of year

Types of migration: descriptive a-d

spatial position on y axis

year on x axis

• xeric animals are usually nomadic (dont go back to space)

Types of migration: descriptive e-g

e. go through migration, but some are residents

• usually winter range yr round

f. big events happens to where the animal migrates to a new habitat

• still repeated movement to access different resources, but doesn’t hapen every yr. based on resources or weather

g. may have different summer and winter ranges, winter summer a, w.s. b., etc

Facultative migration

animals only migrate
some years, dependent on internal state or
environmental conditions

Partial migration

not all individuals from a
population migrate. Often related to
competition within the population
• Elk

Mixed migration

animals may have different
summer or winter ranges year to year, therefore
they migrate different distances

Latitudinal migration

see this in whales; go north and south

• wildebeest (best on wet/dry season and forage avail)

• saiga antelope

Altitudinal migration

• summer/winter mig.

• guanacos, bighorn sheep, elk

• moving up slope in summer, moving down slope in winter

Migration that is not related to latitude
or elevation

• elephant seal: longitudinal: accessing breeding resource rather than seasonal food resource

types of migration: scales

• spatial

  • regional

  • local

• Temporal

  • seasonal

  • Diel: zebras move away front water holes at night

what drives migration

Alimental movement / feeding / tracking
• To increase access to food and water
Climatic movement / wintering / refuge
• To avoid unfavorable conditions
• To avoid predation, parasitism, or
disease
Gametic movement / spawning / breeding
• To access mates or increase offspring
recruitment
Some animals may use all three!

Who migrates? (Ungulate edition): Ruminants (artiodactyls) vs. hindgut fermenters (perissodactyls)

• Ruminants are less tolerant of low-quality forage – migrate for food
• Hindgut fermenters limited by water – migrate for surface water

Who migrates? (Ungulate edition): small vs large body size

• Smallest ungulates to migrate are gazelle, ~50 lb.
• If too small, it’s just not efficient to travel far to look for food!
• Small-bodied ruminants track high quality forage more closely – larger animals can
tolerate lower quality food
•  medium-sized ungulates often travel farthest distances

Who migrates? (Ungulate edition): high vs low productivity environments:

• Migration less necessary in high productivity (e.g., tropical) environments
• Also, ungulates are often smaller in high productivity environments

Four stages of migration

• Preparation
• Fuel loading via increased foraging and metabolic
changes
• Movement
• Occurs over land or water, birds and marine
mammals travel farther than terrestrial mammals
• Stopovers
• Settle in habitat to rest and feed, few or many
stopovers
• Arrival
• Territories are reestablished, mates chosen, energy
built up for reproduction

Connectivity

a measure of the ability of
organisms to move among separated patches
of suitable habitat
Key connectivity terms:
• Island biogeography
• Metapopulation
• Dispersal
• Migration
• Matrix: land between suitable habitat patches

even though about half of the earth has low human impact, what is the problem?

High fragmentation in those areas still: roads, fences, etc.

corridors

any space identifiable by species using it that
facilitates the movement of animals or plants over time
between patches of disjunct habitat

what must you consider when making corridors

• Focal species or taxa
• Scale of interest: getting across a road or continent
• Habitat requirements
• Generalists vs. specialists
• Human tolerance
 Corridor type and dimensions

small scale, intermediate scale, and large scale corridors difference

• small: highway crossing

  • often reactive

  • for hard barriers or pinch points

• inter.: land purchases or easments

  • often proactive

  • for prevention of connectivity loss

• Large: collaborative landscape conservation plans

  • integrative

  • to link cores across a species’ range

Why Corridors?
• Objectives for individual animals:

• Increase survival
• Increase movement/dispersal ability
• Increase access to resources

Why Corridors?

Objectives for animal
populations:

• Increase genetic viability
• Maintain metapopulation
dynamics
• Increase population growth rate

Why Corridors? Objectives for human well-being

• Reduced risk from vehicle collisions
• Ecosystem services

South Dakota

Within 30 years, cougar reintroduction in the eastern
US could:
• Reduce deer densities and DVCs by 22%
• Prevent 21,400 human injuries and 155 fatalities
• Save $2.13 billion in avoided costs