Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat Use
ABSTRACT Trade‐offs between food acquisition and predator avoidance shape the landscape‐scale movements of herbivores. These movements create landscape features, such as game trails, which are paths that animals use repeatedly to traverse the landscape. As such, these trails integrate behavioral tra...
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Wiley
2025-01-01
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| Series: | Ecology and Evolution |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.70792 |
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| author | Keenan Stears Melissa H. Schmitt Mike J. Peel Tsumbedzo Ramalevha Douglas J. McCauley Dave I. Thompson Deron E. Burkepile |
| author_facet | Keenan Stears Melissa H. Schmitt Mike J. Peel Tsumbedzo Ramalevha Douglas J. McCauley Dave I. Thompson Deron E. Burkepile |
| author_sort | Keenan Stears |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | ABSTRACT Trade‐offs between food acquisition and predator avoidance shape the landscape‐scale movements of herbivores. These movements create landscape features, such as game trails, which are paths that animals use repeatedly to traverse the landscape. As such, these trails integrate behavioral trade‐offs over space and time. Here, we used remotely sensed imagery to analyze the density of game trails with spatial environmental variables to understand landscape‐scale patterns of herbivore habitat use in an African savanna. Woody plant cover was the best predictor of game trail density, with the highest densities correlating with intermediate woody plant cover. We also explored how patterns of game trail density compared to two known measures of herbivore habitat use (i.e., dung counts and maximum entropy modeling) and found strong quantitative fits. To understand the patterns revealed by the density of game trails, we explored the trade‐off between food acquisition and perceived predation risk across a woody plant cover gradient. Using behavioral observations, we found that the relationship between woody plant cover and the distribution of game trails was likely driven by the risk and reward trade‐off, with less vigilance and more feeding occurring in areas with a high density of game trails and intermediate woody cover. Ultimately, we show that game trails are a novel data source that can be used to identify broadly‐occurring patterns of herbivore habitat use over large spatial scales. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-f183dbd72df74cdba09fbeb48dca7a9d |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2045-7758 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Ecology and Evolution |
| spelling | doaj-art-f183dbd72df74cdba09fbeb48dca7a9d2025-01-29T05:08:41ZengWileyEcology and Evolution2045-77582025-01-01151n/an/a10.1002/ece3.70792Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat UseKeenan Stears0Melissa H. Schmitt1Mike J. Peel2Tsumbedzo Ramalevha3Douglas J. McCauley4Dave I. Thompson5Deron E. Burkepile6Department of Biology University of North Dakota Grand Forks North Dakota USADepartment of Biology University of North Dakota Grand Forks North Dakota USAAgricultural Research Council Animal Production Institute, Rangeland Ecology Group Nelspruit South AfricaSouth African Environmental Observation Network Ndlovu Node, Scientific Services, Kruger National Park Phalaborwa South AfricaDepartment of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology University of California Santa Barbara Santa Barbara California USASouth African Environmental Observation Network Ndlovu Node, Scientific Services, Kruger National Park Phalaborwa South AfricaDepartment of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology University of California Santa Barbara Santa Barbara California USAABSTRACT Trade‐offs between food acquisition and predator avoidance shape the landscape‐scale movements of herbivores. These movements create landscape features, such as game trails, which are paths that animals use repeatedly to traverse the landscape. As such, these trails integrate behavioral trade‐offs over space and time. Here, we used remotely sensed imagery to analyze the density of game trails with spatial environmental variables to understand landscape‐scale patterns of herbivore habitat use in an African savanna. Woody plant cover was the best predictor of game trail density, with the highest densities correlating with intermediate woody plant cover. We also explored how patterns of game trail density compared to two known measures of herbivore habitat use (i.e., dung counts and maximum entropy modeling) and found strong quantitative fits. To understand the patterns revealed by the density of game trails, we explored the trade‐off between food acquisition and perceived predation risk across a woody plant cover gradient. Using behavioral observations, we found that the relationship between woody plant cover and the distribution of game trails was likely driven by the risk and reward trade‐off, with less vigilance and more feeding occurring in areas with a high density of game trails and intermediate woody cover. Ultimately, we show that game trails are a novel data source that can be used to identify broadly‐occurring patterns of herbivore habitat use over large spatial scales.https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.70792African savannagame pathrisk and reward trade‐offspecies distributionswoody plant cover |
| spellingShingle | Keenan Stears Melissa H. Schmitt Mike J. Peel Tsumbedzo Ramalevha Douglas J. McCauley Dave I. Thompson Deron E. Burkepile Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat Use Ecology and Evolution African savanna game path risk and reward trade‐off species distributions woody plant cover |
| title | Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat Use |
| title_full | Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat Use |
| title_fullStr | Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat Use |
| title_full_unstemmed | Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat Use |
| title_short | Remotely‐Sensed Game Trails Are a Behavioral Footprint That Explains Patterns of Herbivore Habitat Use |
| title_sort | remotely sensed game trails are a behavioral footprint that explains patterns of herbivore habitat use |
| topic | African savanna game path risk and reward trade‐off species distributions woody plant cover |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.70792 |
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