Forest fire is often considered a primary threat to California spotted owls (Strix occidentalis occidentalis) because fire has the potential to rapidly alter owl habitat. We examined effects of fire on 7 radiomarked California spotted owls from 4 territories by quantifying use of habitat for nesting, roosting, and foraging according to severity of burn in and near a 610‐km2fire in the southern Sierra Nevada, California, USA, 4 years after fire. Three nests were located in mixed‐conifer forests, 2 in areas of moderate‐severity burn, and one in an area of low‐severity burn, and one nest was located in an unburned area of mixed‐conifer‐hardwood forest. For roosting during the breeding season, spotted owls selected low‐severity burned forest and avoided moderate‐ and high‐severity burned areas; unburned forest was used in proportion with availability. Within 1 km of the center of their foraging areas, spotted owls selected all severities of burned forest and avoided unburned forest. Beyond 1.5 km, there were no discernable differences in use patterns among burn severities. Most owls foraged in high‐severity burned forest more than in all other burn categories; high‐severity burned forests had greater basal area of snags and higher shrub and herbaceous cover, parameters thought to be associated with increased abundance or accessibility of prey. We recommend that burned forests within 1.5 km of nests or roosts of California spotted owls not be salvage‐logged until long‐term effects of fire on spotted owls and their prey are understood more fully.

Examination of spatial variation in demography among or within populations of the same species is a topic of growing interest in ecology. We examined whether spatial variation in demography of a tropical megaherbivore followed the “temporal paradigm” or the “adult survival paradigm” of ungulate population dynamics formulated from temperate-zone studies. We quantified spatial variation in demographic rates for giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis) at regional and continental scales. Regionally, we used photographic capture-mark-recapture data from 860 adult females and 449 calves to estimate adult female survival, calf survival, and reproduction at 5 sites in the Tarangire ecosystem of Tanzania. We examined potential mechanisms for spatial variation in regional demographic rates. At the continental scale, we synthesized demographic estimates from published studies across the range of the species. We created matrix population models for all sites at both scales and used prospective and retrospective analyses to determine which vital rate was most important to variation in population growth rate. Spatial variability of demographic parameters at the continental scale was in agreement with the temporal paradigm of low variability in adult survival and more highly variable reproduction and calf survival. In contrast, at the regional scale, adult female survival had higher spatial variation, in agreement with the adult survival paradigm. At both scales, variation in adult female survival made the greatest contribution to variation in local population growth rates. Our work documented contrasting patterns of spatial variation in demographic rates of giraffes at 2 spatial scales, but at both scales, we found the same vital rate was most important. We also found anthropogenic impacts on adult females are the most likely mechanism of regional population trajectories.

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Fire over the past decade has affected forests in the San Bernardino Mountains of southern California, providing an excellent opportunity to examine how this disturbance, and subsequent post-fire salvage logging, influenced California spotted owl (Strix occidentalis occidentalis) breeding-season site occupancy dynamics there and in the nearby San Jacinto Mountains. Using occupancy survey data from 2003 to 2011 for all-detections and pairs-only data, we estimated annual extinction and colonization probabilities at 71 burned and 97 unburned breeding-season sites before and after fire, while controlling for confounding effects of non-fire-related temporal variation and among-site differences in habitat characteristics. We found no statistically significant effects of fire or salvage logging on occupancy dynamics of spotted owls of southern California. However, we found some evidence that fire and logging effects could be biologically meaningful. For pairs data, the model-averaged mean of fire-related effects on colonization and extinction probabilities resulted in a 0.062 lesser site-occupancy probability in burned sites 1-year post-fire relative to unburned sites. Post-fire salvage logging reduced occupancy an additional 0.046 relative to sites that only burned. We documented a threshold-type relationship between extinction and colonization probabilities and the amount of forested habitat (conifer or hardwood tree cover types) that burned at high severity within a 203-ha core area around spotted owl nests and roost centroids. Sites where approximately 0-50 ha of forested habitat within the core area burned at high severity had extinction probabilities similar to unburned sites, but where more than approximately 50 ha of forested habitat burned severely, extinction probability increased approximately 0.003 for every additional hectare severely burned. The majority (75%) of sites burned below this threshold. Sites where high-severity fire affected >50 ha of forested habitat could still support spotted owls, so all burned sites should be monitored for occupancy before management actions such as salvage logging are undertaken that could be detrimental to the subspecies. We also recommend that managers strive to reduce human-caused ignitions along the wildland-urban interface, particularly at lower elevations where owl sites are at higher risk of extinction from fire. Ó 2013 The Wildlife Society.

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