Recolonizing carnivores: Is cougar predation behaviorally mediated by bears?

Engebretsen, Kristin N.; Beckmann, Jon P.; Lackey, Carl W.; Andreasen, Alyson M.; Schroeder, Cody; Jackson, Pat J.; Young, Julie K.

doi:10.1002/ece3.7424

Cited by 13 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 39 publications

(105 reference statements)

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“…Likewise, Bender et al [16] reported fine-scale habitat segregation among pumas (Puma concolor), coyotes (Canis latrans) and bobcats (Lynx rufus) in the San Andres Mountains as a result of preferences for habitat characteristics that facilitate movements, despite being positively associated with one another. Thus, our results lends support to a growing body of evidence that demonstrates coexistence among carnivores is facilitated by behavioral mechanisms, in addition to spatial and temporal partitioning [16,32,51,[114][115][116].…”

Section: Plos Onesupporting

confidence: 82%

Coursing hyenas and stalking lions: The potential for inter- and intraspecific interactions

Barker

Joubert²,

Kasaona

et al. 2023

PLoS ONE

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Resource partitioning promotes coexistence among guild members, and carnivores reduce interference competition through behavioral mechanisms that promote spatio-temporal separation. We analyzed sympatric lion and spotted hyena movements and activity patterns to ascertain the mechanisms facilitating their coexistence within semi-arid and wetland ecosystems. We identified recurrent high-use (revisitation) and extended stay (duration) areas within home ranges, as well as correlated movement-derived measures of inter- and intraspecific interactions with environmental variables. Spatial overlaps among lions and hyenas expanded during the wet season, and occurred at edges of home ranges, around water-points, along pathways between patches of high-use areas. Lions shared more of their home ranges with spotted hyenas in arid ecosystems, but shared more of their ranges with conspecifics in mesic environments. Despite shared space use, we found evidence for subtle temporal differences in the nocturnal movement and activity patterns between the two predators, suggesting a fine localized-scale avoidance strategy. Revisitation frequency and duration within home ranges were influenced by interspecific interactions, after land cover categories and diel cycles. Intraspecific interactions were also important for lions and, important for hyenas were moon illumination and ungulates attracted to former anthrax carcass sites in Etosha, with distance to water in Chobe/Linyanti. Recursion and duration according to locales of competitor probabilities were similar among female lions and both sexes of hyenas, but different for male lions. Our results suggest that lions and spotted hyenas mediate the potential for interference competition through subtle differences in temporal activity, fine-scale habitat use differentiation, and localized reactive-avoidance behaviors. These findings enhance our understanding of the potential effects of interspecific interactions among large carnivore space-use patterns within an apex predator system and show adaptability across heterogeneous and homogeneous environments. Future conservation plans should emphasize the importance of inter- and intraspecific competition within large carnivore communities, particularly moderating such effects within increasingly fragmented landscapes.

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Section: Plos Onesupporting

confidence: 82%

Coursing hyenas and stalking lions: The potential for inter- and intraspecific interactions

Barker

Joubert²,

Kasaona

et al. 2023

PLoS ONE

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show abstract

“…Likewise, Bender et al [15] reported fine-scale habitat segregation among pumas (Puma concolor), coyotes (Canis latrans) and bobcats (Lynx rufus) in the San Andres Mountains as a result of preferences for habitat characteristics that facilitate movements, despite being positively associated with one another. Thus, our results lends support to a growing body of evidence that demonstrates coexistence among carnivores is facilitated by behavioural mechanisms, in addition to spatial and temporal partitioning [15,31,51,114,115].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 83%

Coursing hyenas and stalking lions: the potential for inter- and intraspecific interactions

Barker

Joubert²,

Kasaona

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Resource partitioning promotes coexistence among guild members, and carnivores reduce interference competition through behavioural mechanisms that promote spatio-temporal separation. We analyzed sympatric lion and spotted hyena movements and activity patterns to ascertain the mechanisms facilitating their coexistence within semi-arid and wetland ecosystems. We identified recurrent high-use (revisitation) and extended stay (duration) areas within home ranges, and correlated environmental variables with movement-derived measures of inter- and intraspecific interactions. Spatial overlaps among lions and hyenas occurred at edges of home ranges, around water-points, along pathways between patches of high-use areas, and expanded during the wet season. Lions shared more of their home ranges with spotted hyenas in arid ecosystems, but shared more of their ranges with conspecifics in mesic environments. Despite shared space use, we found evidence for subtle temporal differences in the nocturnal movement and activity patterns between the two predators, suggesting a fine localized-scale avoidance strategy. Revisitation frequency and duration within home ranges were influenced by interspecific interactions, subsequent to land cover categories and diel cycles. Intraspecific interactions were also important for lions and, for hyenas, moon illumination and ungulates attracted to former anthrax carcass sites in Etosha, with distance to water in Chobe/Linyanti. Recursion and duration according to locales of competitor probabilities were similar among female lions and both sexes of hyenas, but different for male lions. Our results suggest that lions and spotted hyenas mediate the potential for interference competition through subtle differences in temporal activity, fine-scale habitat use differentiation, and localized reactive-avoidance behaviours. These findings enhance our understanding of the potential effects of interspecific interactions among large carnivore space-use patterns within an apex predator system, and show adaptability across heterogeneous and homogeneous environments. Future conservation plans should emphasize the importance of inter- and intraspecific competition within large carnivore communities, particularly moderating such effects within increasingly fragmented landscapes.

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“…In areas of range overlap with competing, sympatric grizzly bear, black bear's avoidance of grizzlies has been documented to result in increased temporal and spatial overlap with human activity (Apps et al, 2006; Belant et al, 2010; Ladle et al, 2018). In contrast, in areas where black bear overlap with cougars, human avoidance may be heightened due to supplemental food availability from cached carcasses by cougars cached carcasses by cougars; black bear are known to exhibit kleptoparasitism and heavily scavenge on these caches (Elbroch & Kusler, 2018; Engebretsen et al, 2021). There are of course areas where black bear do not avoid increasing human population densities despite a lack of sympatric competitors (e.g., Urban areas in Appalachia; Gould, 2020) and additional factors contributing to differing black bear‐environment relationships in these areas are likely at play (e.g., protected area status; hunting status of an area).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What drives spatially varying ecological relationships in a wide‐ranging species?

Pease

Pacifici

Kays

et al. 2022

Diversity and Distributions

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Aim: Decades of research on species distributions has revealed geographic variation in species-environment relationships for a given species. That is, the way a species uses the local environment varies across geographic space. However, the drivers underlying this variation are contested and still largely unexplored. Niche traits that are conserved should reflect the evolutionary history of a species whereas more flexible ecological traits could vary at finer scales, reflecting local adaptation.Location: North America. Methods:We used mammal observations during a 5-year period from the iNaturalist biodiversity database and a local ensemble modelling approach to explore spatial variation in American black bear (Ursus americanus) relationships with eight ecological correlates. We tested four biologically driven hypotheses to explain the patterns of local adaptation. We evaluated non-stationarity in ecological relationships using a Stationarity Index and tested predictive performance using an independent, nationallevel animal occurrence data set. Results:We documented considerable spatial non-stationarity in all eight environmental relationships, with the greatest spatial variation occurring in bear's relationship to climatic factors. Notably, the greatest variation in environmental relationships tended to occur along the current boundaries of the species' range, potentially representing the ecological limits to the species geographic range. We additionally documented that spatial variation in relationships with land cover and anthropogenic factors were best explained by niche conservatism at the subspecies level, whereas climatic relationships were better explained by local adaptation. Main Conclusions:Based on these results, we propose that the current distribution of American black bear is determined by an evolutionary legacy of habitat relationships unique to each subspecies combined with more fine-scale local adaptation to climatic conditions. This result suggests that black bears should be adaptable to climatic changes over the 21st century and that management of habitat and human-bear relationships could be considered at the subspecies level.

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Recolonizing carnivores: Is cougar predation behaviorally mediated by bears?

Abstract: This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Cited by 13 publications

References 39 publications

Coursing hyenas and stalking lions: The potential for inter- and intraspecific interactions

Coursing hyenas and stalking lions: The potential for inter- and intraspecific interactions

Coursing hyenas and stalking lions: the potential for inter- and intraspecific interactions

What drives spatially varying ecological relationships in a wide‐ranging species?

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