Home Range and Habitat Use of West Virginia Canis latrans (Coyote)

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Fine‐scale movements and behaviors of coyotes (Canis latrans) during their reproductive period

Chamberlain

Cohen

Wightman

et al. 2021

“…To determine territorial status of collared animals, we used a combination of ≥3 months of space use by coyotes (Hinton et al, 2015) and a rarefaction curve for each animal created by calculating monthly home ranges (Dellinger et al, 2013). Previous studies have found that resident coyotes in the southeastern U.S. maintain home ranges that range from approximately 5 to 45 km 2 (Hinton et al, 2015, Mastro et al 2019. Thus, we classified resident coyotes as animals that showed stable space use for ≥3 months and had home ranges smaller than 45 km 2 .…”

Section: Movement Data Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Resident and transient coyotes exhibit differential patterns of movement behavior across heterogeneous landscapes in the southeastern United States

Webster

Beasley

Hinton³

et al. 2022

Coyotes (Canis latrans) are a highly adaptable canid species whose behavioral plasticity has allowed them to persist in a wide array of habitats throughout North America. As generalists, coyotes can alter movement patterns and change territorial strategies between residency (high site fidelity) and transiency (low site fidelity) to maximize fitness. Uncertainty remains about resident and transient coyote movement patterns and habitat use because research has reached conflicting conclusions regarding patterns of habitat use by both groups. We quantified effects of habitat on resident and transient coyote movement behavior using first passage time (FPT) analysis, which assesses recursive movement along an individual's movement path to delineate where they exhibit area‐restricted search (ARS) behaviors relative to habitat attributes. We quantified monthly movement rates for 171 coyotes (76 residents and 53 transients) and then used estimated FPT values in generalized linear mixed models to quantify monthly habitat use for resident and transient coyotes. Transients had greater movement rates than residents across all months except January. Resident FPT values were positively correlated with agricultural land cover during fall and winter, but negatively correlated with agriculture during spring. Resident FPT values were also negatively correlated with developed habitats during May–August, deciduous land cover during June–August, and wetlands during September–January except November. FPT values of transient coyotes were positively correlated with developed areas throughout much of the year and near wetlands during July–September. Transient FPT values were negatively correlated with agriculture during all months except June and July. High FPT values (ARS behavior) of residents and transients were generally correlated with greater densities of edge habitat. Although we observed high individual variation in space use, our study found substantive differences in habitat use between residents and transients, providing further evidence that complexity and plasticity of coyote habitat use is influenced by territorial strategy.

“…In the United States, research on coyotes ( Canis latrans ) has increased significantly over the last several decades because of the species' recent range expansion (Hinton et al, 2019; Hody & Kays, 2018), role as the top canid predator in most regions (Gompper, 2002; Kilgo et al, 2010; Robinson et al, 2014), ability to live in urban areas (Breck et al, 2019; Gehrt et al, 2009; Lombardi et al, 2017), and hybridization with red wolves ( Canis rufus ; Bohling & Waits, 2015; Hinton et al, 2018; Nowak, 2002) and eastern wolves ( Canis lycaon ; Benson et al, 2012; Rutledge et al, 2012; Wilson et al, 2000). In the southeastern United States, average home range sizes reported for resident coyotes are relatively large (range = 5.2–85.0 km 2 ; Chamberlain et al, 2021; Hickman et al, 2016; Hinton et al, 2015; Mastro et al, 2019; Stevenson et al, 2019; Ward et al, 2018) and consist of a diversity of land cover ranging from open anthropogenic (i.e., urban and agriculture) to dense vegetation cover (Hickman et al, 2016; Hinton et al, 2015; Stevenson et al, 2019; Ward et al, 2018). Recent studies of coyotes in the southeastern United States reported that coyotes tend to select early successional vegetation communities and open landcover types (Hinton et al, 2015; Stevenson et al, 2019) and primarily consume mammalian prey and fruit (Cherry et al, 2016; Hinton et al, 2017, 2021; Schrecengost et al, 2008; Ward et al, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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

Youngmann

Hinton²,

Bakner

et al. 2022

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.