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Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore

Coyotes (Canis latrans) colonized the southeastern United States over the last century as large predators, including the red wolf (Canis rufus) and eastern cougar (Puma concolor), were extirpated from the region. As a generalist carnivore, the coyote preys on white‐tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianu...

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Autores principales: Youngmann, Jordan L., Hinton, Joseph W., Bakner, Nicholas W., Chamberlain, Michael J., D'Angelo, Gino J.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9685673/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36440319
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.9540
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author Youngmann, Jordan L.
Hinton, Joseph W.
Bakner, Nicholas W.
Chamberlain, Michael J.
D'Angelo, Gino J.
author_facet Youngmann, Jordan L.
Hinton, Joseph W.
Bakner, Nicholas W.
Chamberlain, Michael J.
D'Angelo, Gino J.
author_sort Youngmann, Jordan L.
collection PubMed
description Coyotes (Canis latrans) colonized the southeastern United States over the last century as large predators, including the red wolf (Canis rufus) and eastern cougar (Puma concolor), were extirpated from the region. As a generalist carnivore, the coyote preys on white‐tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) and various smaller mammals, birds, and vegetation. While resource selection by coyotes has been well documented at the home‐range scale, little is known about their foraging behavior, which is an important factor in thoroughly understanding influences of coyotes on prey and sympatric carnivores. We assessed third‐order resource selection of coyotes at sites across Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina during 2015–2016. Using GPS collars, we tracked 41 resident coyotes across four calendar seasons and identified suspected foraging areas using recursive analysis where individuals repeatedly returned to known locations. We found that resident coyotes selected for open landcover types throughout the year, while avoiding primary and secondary roads. Additionally, resident coyotes avoided forested landcover types while selecting for forest edges except from April to June when they foraged within interior forest away from edges. Previous studies have documented substantive predation rates on white‐tailed deer neonates by coyotes, and that fawn mortality may increase in forested landscapes away from forest edge. Our findings indicate that foraging coyotes may select forest cover types during spring where fawns are more vulnerable to predation. Additionally, there has been debate in the literature as to how coyotes obtain consistent levels of deer in their diets outside of fawning and fall hunting seasons. Our study indicates that use of road‐kill carcasses by coyotes was an unlikely explanation for the presence of deer in coyote diets throughout the year, as coyotes in our study were not observed using roads during foraging excursions.
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spelling pubmed-96856732022-11-25 Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore Youngmann, Jordan L. Hinton, Joseph W. Bakner, Nicholas W. Chamberlain, Michael J. D'Angelo, Gino J. Ecol Evol Research Articles Coyotes (Canis latrans) colonized the southeastern United States over the last century as large predators, including the red wolf (Canis rufus) and eastern cougar (Puma concolor), were extirpated from the region. As a generalist carnivore, the coyote preys on white‐tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) and various smaller mammals, birds, and vegetation. While resource selection by coyotes has been well documented at the home‐range scale, little is known about their foraging behavior, which is an important factor in thoroughly understanding influences of coyotes on prey and sympatric carnivores. We assessed third‐order resource selection of coyotes at sites across Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina during 2015–2016. Using GPS collars, we tracked 41 resident coyotes across four calendar seasons and identified suspected foraging areas using recursive analysis where individuals repeatedly returned to known locations. We found that resident coyotes selected for open landcover types throughout the year, while avoiding primary and secondary roads. Additionally, resident coyotes avoided forested landcover types while selecting for forest edges except from April to June when they foraged within interior forest away from edges. Previous studies have documented substantive predation rates on white‐tailed deer neonates by coyotes, and that fawn mortality may increase in forested landscapes away from forest edge. Our findings indicate that foraging coyotes may select forest cover types during spring where fawns are more vulnerable to predation. Additionally, there has been debate in the literature as to how coyotes obtain consistent levels of deer in their diets outside of fawning and fall hunting seasons. Our study indicates that use of road‐kill carcasses by coyotes was an unlikely explanation for the presence of deer in coyote diets throughout the year, as coyotes in our study were not observed using roads during foraging excursions. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2022-11-24 /pmc/articles/PMC9685673/ /pubmed/36440319 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.9540 Text en © 2022 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
Youngmann, Jordan L.
Hinton, Joseph W.
Bakner, Nicholas W.
Chamberlain, Michael J.
D'Angelo, Gino J.
Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore
title Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore
title_full Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore
title_fullStr Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore
title_full_unstemmed Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore
title_short Recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore
title_sort recursive use of home ranges and seasonal shifts in foraging behavior by a generalist carnivore
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9685673/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36440319
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.9540
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