Food habits of adult male white‐tailed deer determined by camera collars

Abstract

Many factors influence what and why animals select the foods they eat. Several methods have been used to estimate food habits of herbivores, but they all have limitations such as defining available foods and misrepresenting particular forages. We evaluated plant consumption by adult male white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) with camera collars in a semi-enclosed population in southern Texas, USA, during late autumn 2010. We collected 1,241 videos taken at all times of the day and night from 15 camera collars and confirmed consumption of 40 plant species with an 84% probability of identification. Diets of individual deer varied considerably, though there was an apparent preference for prickly-pear cactus (Opuntia engelmannii) and blackbrush acacia (Vachellia rigidula). Our results were consistent with other conventional studies of food habits of deer in the region. Yet, we feel camera collars provide a more thorough and detailed representation of forage species available and consumed. Strategic deployments of camera collars could advance the understanding of nutritional requirements and behavior of deer because a broad array of concurrent data can be collected. Published 2015. This article is a U.S. Government work and is in the public domain in the USA.

Environmental factors shaping stable isotope signatures of modern red deer (Cervus elaphus) inhabiting various habitats

“…Hair of modern caribou from closed canopy habitats (i.e., boreal forest) were depleted in 13 C relative to hair of individuals from open environments (i.e., tundra) [15,57]. Finally, the variability within study site may also be shaped by individual food preferences [58]; therefore, the effect of supplementary feeding may differ between individuals from a single study site.…”

Using Camera Collars to Study Survival of Migratory Caribou Calves

“…We excluded collars with more than 30% of videos missing from analyses to prevent an unequal number of videos analyzed per day and an unrepresentative frequency of calf resightings (Lavelle et al 2015). Therefore, we analyzed one video/h instead of 3 to limit the duration of video analyses.…”

“…High‐resolution camera collars provide images approximating the animal's point of view, and combined with a global positioning system (GPS), can document the immediate surroundings and the behavior of collared animals without observer effects (Lavelle et al 2012, Thompson et al 2012). Other studies have used similar technology to assess foraging behavior of brown bears ( Ursus actos ; Brockman et al 2017), resource selection by woodland caribou ( Rangifer tarandus tarandus ; Thompson et al 2014), food habits of white‐tailed deer ( Odocoileus virginianus ; Lavelle et al 2015), and the impact of climate change on polar bears (Ursus maritimus ; Pagano et al 2018). Thus, we evaluated the potential of high‐resolution camera collars installed on female migratory caribou to assess survival rates of calves in the first few weeks of life and gather information on fine‐scale environmental factors that could explain calf survival.…”

Evaluating Contributions of Recent Tracking-Based Animal Movement Ecology to Conservation Management

“…Similarly, in wildlife disease studies, samples collected from an animal's environment (e.g., toxins in potential food) are linked to those collected from the animal itself (e.g., toxins in blood). Here again, rarely-used onboard sensors that sample toxins or disease in the animal and in the environment or the food an animal ate (Loyd et al, 2013;Lavelle et al, 2015;McGregor et al, 2015) could make explicit, and more valuable, the linkages between the location, experience, and the internal state of an animal.…”