Using activity densities as an alternative approach to measuring ungulate giving-up densities in the presence of non-target species

Wuensch, Matthew; Pratt, Alexander M.; Ward, David

doi:10.1007/s00265-022-03283-6

Cited by 1 publication

(2 citation statements)

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“…To quantify the patch use of deer, we measured activity densities via feeders that were constructed from polyvinyl chloride (PVC) pipe and speci cally designed to restrict the access of non-target species (Wuensch et al 2023). The PVC feeder design consisted of a feeder that was constructed from 10.2 cm pipe that created a feeding spout for deer to withdraw food.…”

Section: Collecting Patch Preference Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The lack of inedible substrate in the feeders meant that they lacked diminishing returns, which is incorporated into other foraging study designs (Brown 1988;Kotler and Brown 1990). Therefore, the activity densities that we measured from the feeders provided us with information on deer presence and foraging effort within different patch types (China et al 2008;Wuensch et al 2023) At each of our three sites, we placed four PVC feeders on three 120 m transects (12 total feeders per site) that were perpendicular to the linear ecotone between the forest and meadow patches. Each transect extended 60 m from the ecotone into the forest and 60 m from the ecotone into the meadow.…”

Section: Collecting Patch Preference Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Anthropogenic meadows provide foraging subsidies for white-tailed deer in fragmented forest ecosystems

Wuensch,

Eagar,

Ward

2024

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White-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) populations persist at densities higher than historical estimates throughout much of their North American range. In forest ecosystems, heavy browsing by high-density deer populations can suppress the growth and regeneration of woody plants and promote the establishment and growth of non-preferred forage items, such as grasses and ferns. Additionally, as forests are altered by anthropogenic development, grasslands and meadows are becoming increasingly common in forest landscapes where deer occur. We used activity densities to measure the seasonal patch preference of white-tailed deer between forest patches and anthropogenically-introduced meadows in northeast Ohio, a region with high-density deer populations. We also quantified the plant communities that were present in each patch type to identify forage plants that were available to deer. We found that deer preferred meadow patches and avoided forests during spring and summer. Meadow patches primarily consisted of non-native forage plants that are nutritionally beneficial to deer, whereas forests possessed fewer nutritionally beneficial plants and contained an abundance of open ground. However, as plants senesced and forage availability on the landscape decreased during autumn and winter, deer did not prefer any patch type. Our results suggest that in anthropogenically fragmented forests, meadows can provide deer with a potentially overlooked foraging subsidy that should be considered when managing high-density deer populations.

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Section: Collecting Patch Preference Datamentioning

confidence: 99%