Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate
Abstract Changes in climate are driving widespread landscape changes in northern ecosystems, altering the size and distribution of wildlife populations over multi‐decadal time scales. Extreme weather events are also expected to become more common over time, affecting a variety of species, and mounta...
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crwiley:10.1002/ecs2.2513 2024-09-30T14:30:13+00:00 Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate Rattenbury, Kumi L. Schmidt, Joshua H. Swanson, David K. Borg, Bridget L. Mangipane, Buck A. Sousanes, Pam J. U.S. National Park Service through the Central Alaska and Arctic Inventory and Monitoring Networks Western Arctic Parklands Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve Denali National Park and Preserve Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve Lake Clark National Park and Preserve 2018 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.2513 https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1002%2Fecs2.2513 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/ecs2.2513 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1002/ecs2.2513 https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/ecs2.2513 en eng Wiley http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Ecosphere volume 9, issue 11 ISSN 2150-8925 2150-8925 journal-article 2018 crwiley https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.2513 2024-09-03T04:24:46Z Abstract Changes in climate are driving widespread landscape changes in northern ecosystems, altering the size and distribution of wildlife populations over multi‐decadal time scales. Extreme weather events are also expected to become more common over time, affecting a variety of species, and mountain ungulates may be particularly susceptible because they occupy habitats with particularly harsh winter weather conditions. To explore the impacts of weather conditions and adverse weather events as population drivers, we surveyed Dall's sheep throughout their latitudinal range in Alaska and assessed lamb production and population trend in relation to end of the continuous snow season (CSS) as a measure of spring onset. In 2013, spring onset was extraordinarily late, providing an opportunity to directly assess the impacts of variability in weather on sheep population dynamics. We hypothesized that the timing of the end of the CSS would have greater impacts in arctic areas where conditions are presumably most limiting. We found that lamb production was negatively related to the annual timing of the end of the CSS and was near 0 in arctic areas in 2013. The 2013 event was also associated with ~40–70% declines in overall sheep numbers in arctic areas, indicating adult survival was also impacted. Overall, our results suggest that expected increases in adverse weather events may have direct, lasting impacts on mountain ungulate populations and that these impacts can be expected to be most extreme for populations occurring at northern range limits where growing season conditions are most restricted. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Alaska Wiley Online Library Arctic Ecosphere 9 11 |
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Wiley Online Library |
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crwiley |
language |
English |
description |
Abstract Changes in climate are driving widespread landscape changes in northern ecosystems, altering the size and distribution of wildlife populations over multi‐decadal time scales. Extreme weather events are also expected to become more common over time, affecting a variety of species, and mountain ungulates may be particularly susceptible because they occupy habitats with particularly harsh winter weather conditions. To explore the impacts of weather conditions and adverse weather events as population drivers, we surveyed Dall's sheep throughout their latitudinal range in Alaska and assessed lamb production and population trend in relation to end of the continuous snow season (CSS) as a measure of spring onset. In 2013, spring onset was extraordinarily late, providing an opportunity to directly assess the impacts of variability in weather on sheep population dynamics. We hypothesized that the timing of the end of the CSS would have greater impacts in arctic areas where conditions are presumably most limiting. We found that lamb production was negatively related to the annual timing of the end of the CSS and was near 0 in arctic areas in 2013. The 2013 event was also associated with ~40–70% declines in overall sheep numbers in arctic areas, indicating adult survival was also impacted. Overall, our results suggest that expected increases in adverse weather events may have direct, lasting impacts on mountain ungulate populations and that these impacts can be expected to be most extreme for populations occurring at northern range limits where growing season conditions are most restricted. |
author2 |
U.S. National Park Service through the Central Alaska and Arctic Inventory and Monitoring Networks Western Arctic Parklands Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve Denali National Park and Preserve Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve Lake Clark National Park and Preserve |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Rattenbury, Kumi L. Schmidt, Joshua H. Swanson, David K. Borg, Bridget L. Mangipane, Buck A. Sousanes, Pam J. |
spellingShingle |
Rattenbury, Kumi L. Schmidt, Joshua H. Swanson, David K. Borg, Bridget L. Mangipane, Buck A. Sousanes, Pam J. Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate |
author_facet |
Rattenbury, Kumi L. Schmidt, Joshua H. Swanson, David K. Borg, Bridget L. Mangipane, Buck A. Sousanes, Pam J. |
author_sort |
Rattenbury, Kumi L. |
title |
Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate |
title_short |
Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate |
title_full |
Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate |
title_fullStr |
Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate |
title_full_unstemmed |
Delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate |
title_sort |
delayed spring onset drives declines in abundance and recruitment in a mountain ungulate |
publisher |
Wiley |
publishDate |
2018 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.2513 https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1002%2Fecs2.2513 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/ecs2.2513 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1002/ecs2.2513 https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/ecs2.2513 |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic Alaska |
genre_facet |
Arctic Alaska |
op_source |
Ecosphere volume 9, issue 11 ISSN 2150-8925 2150-8925 |
op_rights |
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.2513 |
container_title |
Ecosphere |
container_volume |
9 |
container_issue |
11 |
_version_ |
1811635245189955584 |