Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada
The "Den Mother" marten habitat quality models were created to provide insight into American marten habitat selection behavior and to promote the recovery of the Newfoundland marten (Martes americana atrata) population. Although these objectives are typical of most wildlife habitat modelin...
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ftdatacite:10.26076/825e-95c8 2023-05-15T13:21:53+02:00 Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada Adair, William A. 2003 https://dx.doi.org/10.26076/825e-95c8 https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/6589 unknown Utah State University article-journal Text ScholarlyArticle 2003 ftdatacite https://doi.org/10.26076/825e-95c8 2022-02-08T13:25:49Z The "Den Mother" marten habitat quality models were created to provide insight into American marten habitat selection behavior and to promote the recovery of the Newfoundland marten (Martes americana atrata) population. Although these objectives are typical of most wildlife habitat modeling projects, the marten's idiosyncratic habitat ecology and apparently intractable conflicts associated with timber harvesting motivated a unique, process-oriented approach to appraising landscapes. The Den Mother models used optimal decision-making principles to synthesize critical resources (den sites and foraging opportunities) and constraints (adverse thermal situations and exposure to predations) into a single hierarchical framework. The resulting spatially explicit, combinatorial optimization models depend on a complex array of interacting assumptions. However, in mechanistic models, explicit assumptions provide the means by which insights are gained. For example, manipulating prey population parameters provided a clear demonstration of how resource conditions confound the relationship between landscape configuration and marten fitness, thereby challenging conventional definitions of habitat based on vegetation alone. Likewise, the models' sensitivity to spatial circumstances argued against the concept of an "optimal landscape," a traditional objective for wildlife habitat analyses. Although the model analyses did not refute the conventional wisdom that marten are strongly associated with (and may depend on) large contiguous blocks of senescing and defoliated forests, they did suggest that the marten is an opening-sensitive, rather than coresensitive, species. The models also suggested new avenues for research addressing marten den site selection, predator avoidance behavior, foraging efficiency, and space use strategies, as well as new techniques for assessing the trade-offs that govern marten habitat selection behavior. Finally, the models also suggested new guidelines for promoting marten recovery in an adaptive management context, including recommendations for placing artificial resting structures; creating favorable landscape mosaics; managing ephemeral resources such as transition old-growth forests, defoliation, and coarse woody debris; and developing alternative, competing management scenarios that address both forest and prey conditions simultaneously. Text American marten Martes americana Newfoundland DataCite Metadata Store (German National Library of Science and Technology) Canada |
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The "Den Mother" marten habitat quality models were created to provide insight into American marten habitat selection behavior and to promote the recovery of the Newfoundland marten (Martes americana atrata) population. Although these objectives are typical of most wildlife habitat modeling projects, the marten's idiosyncratic habitat ecology and apparently intractable conflicts associated with timber harvesting motivated a unique, process-oriented approach to appraising landscapes. The Den Mother models used optimal decision-making principles to synthesize critical resources (den sites and foraging opportunities) and constraints (adverse thermal situations and exposure to predations) into a single hierarchical framework. The resulting spatially explicit, combinatorial optimization models depend on a complex array of interacting assumptions. However, in mechanistic models, explicit assumptions provide the means by which insights are gained. For example, manipulating prey population parameters provided a clear demonstration of how resource conditions confound the relationship between landscape configuration and marten fitness, thereby challenging conventional definitions of habitat based on vegetation alone. Likewise, the models' sensitivity to spatial circumstances argued against the concept of an "optimal landscape," a traditional objective for wildlife habitat analyses. Although the model analyses did not refute the conventional wisdom that marten are strongly associated with (and may depend on) large contiguous blocks of senescing and defoliated forests, they did suggest that the marten is an opening-sensitive, rather than coresensitive, species. The models also suggested new avenues for research addressing marten den site selection, predator avoidance behavior, foraging efficiency, and space use strategies, as well as new techniques for assessing the trade-offs that govern marten habitat selection behavior. Finally, the models also suggested new guidelines for promoting marten recovery in an adaptive management context, including recommendations for placing artificial resting structures; creating favorable landscape mosaics; managing ephemeral resources such as transition old-growth forests, defoliation, and coarse woody debris; and developing alternative, competing management scenarios that address both forest and prey conditions simultaneously. |
format |
Text |
author |
Adair, William A. |
spellingShingle |
Adair, William A. Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada |
author_facet |
Adair, William A. |
author_sort |
Adair, William A. |
title |
Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada |
title_short |
Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada |
title_full |
Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada |
title_fullStr |
Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada |
title_full_unstemmed |
Modeling Habitat Quality for American Martens in Western Newfoundland, Canada |
title_sort |
modeling habitat quality for american martens in western newfoundland, canada |
publisher |
Utah State University |
publishDate |
2003 |
url |
https://dx.doi.org/10.26076/825e-95c8 https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/6589 |
geographic |
Canada |
geographic_facet |
Canada |
genre |
American marten Martes americana Newfoundland |
genre_facet |
American marten Martes americana Newfoundland |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.26076/825e-95c8 |
_version_ |
1766362007054843904 |