Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?

Introduced mammalian predators can have devastating impacts on recipient ecosystems and disrupt native predator–prey relationships. Feral cats (Felis catus) have been implicated in the decline and extinction of many Australian native species and developing effective and affordable methods to control...

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Autores principales: Palmer, Russell, Anderson, Hannah, Richards, Brooke, Craig, Michael D., Gibson, Lesley
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8104397/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33961676
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0251304
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author Palmer, Russell
Anderson, Hannah
Richards, Brooke
Craig, Michael D.
Gibson, Lesley
author_facet Palmer, Russell
Anderson, Hannah
Richards, Brooke
Craig, Michael D.
Gibson, Lesley
author_sort Palmer, Russell
collection PubMed
description Introduced mammalian predators can have devastating impacts on recipient ecosystems and disrupt native predator–prey relationships. Feral cats (Felis catus) have been implicated in the decline and extinction of many Australian native species and developing effective and affordable methods to control them is a national priority. While there has been considerable progress in the lethal control of feral cats, effective management at landscape scales has proved challenging. Justification of the allocation of resources to feral cat control programs requires demonstration of the conservation benefit baiting provides to native species susceptible to cat predation. Here, we examined the effectiveness of a landscape-scale Eradicat® baiting program to protect threatened northern quolls (Dasyurus hallucatus) from feral cat predation in a heterogeneous rocky landscape in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. We used camera traps and GPS collars fitted to feral cats to monitor changes in activity patterns of feral cats and northern quolls at a baited treatment site and unbaited reference site over four years. Feral cat populations appeared to be naturally sparse in our study area, and camera trap monitoring showed no significant effect of baiting on cat detections. However, mortality rates of collared feral cats ranged from 18–33% after baiting, indicating that the program was reducing cat numbers. Our study demonstrated that feral cat baiting had a positive effect on northern quoll populations, with evidence of range expansion at the treatment site. We suggest that the rugged rocky habitat preferred by northern quolls in the Pilbara buffered them to some extent from feral cat predation, and baiting was sufficient to demonstrate a positive effect in this relatively short-term project. A more strategic approach to feral cat management is likely to be required in the longer-term to maximise the efficacy of control programs and thereby improve the conservation outlook for susceptible threatened fauna.
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spelling pubmed-81043972021-05-18 Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator? Palmer, Russell Anderson, Hannah Richards, Brooke Craig, Michael D. Gibson, Lesley PLoS One Research Article Introduced mammalian predators can have devastating impacts on recipient ecosystems and disrupt native predator–prey relationships. Feral cats (Felis catus) have been implicated in the decline and extinction of many Australian native species and developing effective and affordable methods to control them is a national priority. While there has been considerable progress in the lethal control of feral cats, effective management at landscape scales has proved challenging. Justification of the allocation of resources to feral cat control programs requires demonstration of the conservation benefit baiting provides to native species susceptible to cat predation. Here, we examined the effectiveness of a landscape-scale Eradicat® baiting program to protect threatened northern quolls (Dasyurus hallucatus) from feral cat predation in a heterogeneous rocky landscape in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. We used camera traps and GPS collars fitted to feral cats to monitor changes in activity patterns of feral cats and northern quolls at a baited treatment site and unbaited reference site over four years. Feral cat populations appeared to be naturally sparse in our study area, and camera trap monitoring showed no significant effect of baiting on cat detections. However, mortality rates of collared feral cats ranged from 18–33% after baiting, indicating that the program was reducing cat numbers. Our study demonstrated that feral cat baiting had a positive effect on northern quoll populations, with evidence of range expansion at the treatment site. We suggest that the rugged rocky habitat preferred by northern quolls in the Pilbara buffered them to some extent from feral cat predation, and baiting was sufficient to demonstrate a positive effect in this relatively short-term project. A more strategic approach to feral cat management is likely to be required in the longer-term to maximise the efficacy of control programs and thereby improve the conservation outlook for susceptible threatened fauna. Public Library of Science 2021-05-07 /pmc/articles/PMC8104397/ /pubmed/33961676 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0251304 Text en © 2021 Palmer et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Palmer, Russell
Anderson, Hannah
Richards, Brooke
Craig, Michael D.
Gibson, Lesley
Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?
title Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?
title_full Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?
title_fullStr Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?
title_full_unstemmed Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?
title_short Does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?
title_sort does aerial baiting for controlling feral cats in a heterogeneous landscape confer benefits to a threatened native meso-predator?
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8104397/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33961676
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0251304
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