Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains
ABSTRACT Railway networks contribute to the direct mortality of wildlife through collisions with trains, which can threaten vulnerable wildlife populations even in protected areas, including grizzly bears ( Ursus arctos ) in Banff and Yoho National Parks, Canada. Mitigation to reduce bear‐train coll...
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crwiley:10.1002/jwmg.21750 2024-09-15T18:40:17+00:00 Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains Pollock, Sonya Z. Whittington, Jesse Nielsen, Scott E. St. Clair, Colleen C. Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada 2019 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.21750 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/jwmg.21750 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1002/jwmg.21750 en eng Wiley http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor The Journal of Wildlife Management volume 83, issue 8, page 1787-1799 ISSN 0022-541X 1937-2817 journal-article 2019 crwiley https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.21750 2024-09-05T05:09:32Z ABSTRACT Railway networks contribute to the direct mortality of wildlife through collisions with trains, which can threaten vulnerable wildlife populations even in protected areas, including grizzly bears ( Ursus arctos ) in Banff and Yoho National Parks, Canada. Mitigation to reduce bear‐train collisions requires information about how grizzly bears use the railway spatially and temporally and how particular types of use might increase collision vulnerability. We used data from 27 grizzly bears fitted with global positioning system (GPS) collars between 2000 and 2016 to relate railway use by bears via resource selection functions to variables that described land cover, human use, and topography. We used the same suite of explanatory variables to distinguish pairs of 4 types of steps, in which 3 successive GPS points (with 2‐hr fix rates) included ≥1 within 30 m of the rail (hereafter on) and 2 others that defined locations where bears effectively entered the railway (first fix off rail, next 2 on), crossed it (only the middle fix on the rail), continued along the railway (all 3 fixes on), or exited the railway corridor (first 2 on, last off). We compared both sites of higher use and each of these 4 step types to the relative frequency of bear‐train collisions, predicting a positive correlation for continue step types. Relative to available locations, bears were more likely to use the railway close to railroad sidings (sections of twinned track where trains sometimes stop), at intermediate distances from human‐use features (e.g., town sites, highways, trails), in areas with lower values of the compound topographic index (a proxy for wetness; within 500 m), and within 90 m of rugged terrain. Seasonally, bears made greater use of the railway in spring and fall. Among 1,515 sequences of 3 steps, crossing locations comprised >50% and were most distinct from continue locations (about 20%), which occurred in areas with more rugged terrain (within 300 m), closer to railway sidings, in spring and fall, and with steps ... Article in Journal/Newspaper Ursus arctos Wiley Online Library The Journal of Wildlife Management 83 8 1787 1799 |
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Open Polar |
collection |
Wiley Online Library |
op_collection_id |
crwiley |
language |
English |
description |
ABSTRACT Railway networks contribute to the direct mortality of wildlife through collisions with trains, which can threaten vulnerable wildlife populations even in protected areas, including grizzly bears ( Ursus arctos ) in Banff and Yoho National Parks, Canada. Mitigation to reduce bear‐train collisions requires information about how grizzly bears use the railway spatially and temporally and how particular types of use might increase collision vulnerability. We used data from 27 grizzly bears fitted with global positioning system (GPS) collars between 2000 and 2016 to relate railway use by bears via resource selection functions to variables that described land cover, human use, and topography. We used the same suite of explanatory variables to distinguish pairs of 4 types of steps, in which 3 successive GPS points (with 2‐hr fix rates) included ≥1 within 30 m of the rail (hereafter on) and 2 others that defined locations where bears effectively entered the railway (first fix off rail, next 2 on), crossed it (only the middle fix on the rail), continued along the railway (all 3 fixes on), or exited the railway corridor (first 2 on, last off). We compared both sites of higher use and each of these 4 step types to the relative frequency of bear‐train collisions, predicting a positive correlation for continue step types. Relative to available locations, bears were more likely to use the railway close to railroad sidings (sections of twinned track where trains sometimes stop), at intermediate distances from human‐use features (e.g., town sites, highways, trails), in areas with lower values of the compound topographic index (a proxy for wetness; within 500 m), and within 90 m of rugged terrain. Seasonally, bears made greater use of the railway in spring and fall. Among 1,515 sequences of 3 steps, crossing locations comprised >50% and were most distinct from continue locations (about 20%), which occurred in areas with more rugged terrain (within 300 m), closer to railway sidings, in spring and fall, and with steps ... |
author2 |
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Pollock, Sonya Z. Whittington, Jesse Nielsen, Scott E. St. Clair, Colleen C. |
spellingShingle |
Pollock, Sonya Z. Whittington, Jesse Nielsen, Scott E. St. Clair, Colleen C. Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains |
author_facet |
Pollock, Sonya Z. Whittington, Jesse Nielsen, Scott E. St. Clair, Colleen C. |
author_sort |
Pollock, Sonya Z. |
title |
Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains |
title_short |
Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains |
title_full |
Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains |
title_fullStr |
Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains |
title_full_unstemmed |
Spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountains |
title_sort |
spatiotemporal railway use by grizzly bears in canada's rocky mountains |
publisher |
Wiley |
publishDate |
2019 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.21750 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/jwmg.21750 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1002/jwmg.21750 |
genre |
Ursus arctos |
genre_facet |
Ursus arctos |
op_source |
The Journal of Wildlife Management volume 83, issue 8, page 1787-1799 ISSN 0022-541X 1937-2817 |
op_rights |
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.21750 |
container_title |
The Journal of Wildlife Management |
container_volume |
83 |
container_issue |
8 |
container_start_page |
1787 |
op_container_end_page |
1799 |
_version_ |
1810484594485493760 |