« Previous AbstractInfluence of snail feces and mucus on oviposition and larval behavior ofPherbellia cinerella (Diptera: Sciomyzidae)    Next AbstractAttraction of newborn rabbits to abdominal odors of adult conspecifics differing in sex and physiological state »

Ecol Appl

Title:		Interacting lethal and nonlethal human activities shape complex risk tolerance behaviors in a mountain herbivore
Author(s):		Courbin N; Garel M; Marchand P; Duparc A; Debeffe L; Borger L; Loison A;
Address:		"Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine (LECA), UMR 5553, Universite Grenoble Alpes, Universite Savoie Mont-Blanc, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Le Bourget-du-Lac, France. Office Francais de la Biodiversite (OFB), Direction de la Recherche et de l'Appui Scientifique - Service Anthropisation et Fonctionnement des Ecosystemes Terrestres, Gieres, France. Office Francais de la Biodiversite (OFB), Direction de la Recherche et de l'Appui Scientifique - Service Anthropisation et Fonctionnement des Ecosystemes Terrestres, Juvignac, France. Comportement et Ecologie de la Faune Sauvage (CEFS), Universite de Toulouse, Institut national de recherche pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (INRAE), Castanet-Tolosan, France. Department of Biosciences, Swansea University, Swansea, UK"
Journal Title:		Ecol Appl
Year:		2022
Volume:		20220602
Issue:		7
Page Number:		e2640 -
DOI:		10.1002/eap.2640
ISSN/ISBN:		1051-0761 (Print) 1051-0761 (Linking)
Abstract:		"Animals perceive human activities as risky and generally respond with fear-induced proactive behaviors to buffer the circadian patterns of lethal and nonlethal disturbances, such as diel migrations (DMs) between risky places during safe nighttime and safer places during risky daytime. However, such responses potentially incur costs through movement or reduced foraging time, so individuals should adjust their tolerance when human activities are harmless, through habituation. Yet this is a challenging cognitive task when lethal and nonlethal risks co-occur, forming complex landscapes of fear. The consequences of this human-induced complexity have, however, rarely been assessed. We studied the individual DM dynamics of chamois (Rupicapra rupicapra rupicapra), 89 GPS-tracked individual-years, from/to trails in the French Alps in areas with co-occurring lethal (hunting) and nonlethal (hiking and skiing) disturbances, with different intensities across seasons. We developed a conceptual framework relying on the risk-disturbance hypothesis and habituation to predict tolerance adjustments of chamois under various disturbance contexts and across contrasted seasonal periods. Based on spatial and statistical analyses combining periodograms and multinomial logistic models, we found that DM in relation to distance to a trail was a consistent response by chamois (~85% of individuals) to avoid human disturbance during daytime, especially during the hiking and hunting periods. Such behavior revealed a low tolerance of most chamois to human activities, although there was considerable interindividual heterogeneity in DM. Interestingly, there was an increased tolerance among the most disturbed diel migrants, potentially through habituation, with chamois performing shorter DMs in areas highly disturbed by hikers. Crucially, chamois that were most human-habituated during the hiking period remained more tolerant in the subsequent harvesting period, which could increase their risk of being harvested. In contrast, individuals less tolerant to hiking performed longer DMs when hunting risk increased, and compared to hiking, hunting exacerbated the threshold distance to trails triggering DMs. No carryover effect of hunting beyond the hunting period was observed. In conclusion, complex human-induced landscapes of fear with co-occurring disturbances by nature-based tourism and hunting may shape unexpected patterns of tolerance to human activities, whereby animal tolerance could become potentially deleterious for individual survival"
Keywords:		Animals Fear Herbivory Human Activities Humans *Rupicapra Seasons French Alps Rupicapra rupicapra rupicapra behavioral plasticity chamois diel migration hunting landscape of fear nature-based tourism trail network;
Notes:		"MedlineCourbin, Nicolas Garel, Mathieu Marchand, Pascal Duparc, Antoine Debeffe, Lucie Borger, Luca Loison, Anne eng Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't 2022/04/21 Ecol Appl. 2022 Oct; 32(7):e2640. doi: 10.1002/eap.2640. Epub 2022 Jun 2"