Spatial behavior of red deer (cervus elaphus) in northern apennines: are we managing them correctly?

Abstract

Backgound Throughout its range, red deer is a well-studied species. In Italy the species occupies two ecologically different ranges: the Alps and the Apennine. Although several studies have described spatial behaviour of red deer in the Italian Alps, no data are available for the Apennine population. Results Spatial behaviour of 13 deer from Northern Apennine range was analysed for the first-time using GPS-GSM telemetry, from 2011 to 2017. Red deer displayed two different strategies coexisting in the population, i.e., migratory and stationary. Females tend to migrate more than males. We found a high level of inter individual variability in the date of migration/return, while each migratory deer is very conservative during the study period. Migration ranges are on average 12±4.2 km far apart from the resident range. Both migratory and resident deer displayed high site fidelity. No switch from migratory to stationary strategy was observed for any deer during the study period, which however could have been too short to detect any switch. At management level, a spatial mismatch was found between deer range and management units (districts) in 44.4% of the cases. Merging the districts belonging of each province to obtain an area of approximately 1.000 km 2 would partially solve such spatial mismatch reducing it to 22%. Conclusions Despite the low sample size, these results can provide guidance for future management actions. An in-dept study with a higher sample size is however required to better understand and manage the red deer Apennine population.

Spatial behavior of red deer (Cervus elaphus) in Northern Apennines: are we managing them correctly?

“…Our findings are limited by the small sample size, which was primarily due to deer capture difficulties. A pilot study carried out in the provinces of Modena [31] has already shown extremely low deer capture success with corral traps: in four winter seasons, one corral trap, active for 182 nights, captured only three individuals (0.02 deer per night). At the study site, hunting has been permitted since 2012.…”