Grizzly bear habitat selection is scale dependent ...

• Main Authors: Ciarniello, L. M., Heard, D. C., Boyce, M. S., Seip, D. R.
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: University of Alberta Library 2007
• Subjects: Ursus arctos; Habitat selection; Canada; Grizzly bears; Spatial extent; Telemetry; British Columbia; Resource selection function
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.7939/r3br9z; https://ualberta.scholaris.ca/handle/123456789/15859

The purpose of our study is to show how ecologists' interpretation of habitat selection by grizzly bears (Ursus arctos) is altered by the scale of observation and also how management questions would be best addressed using predetermined scales of analysis. Using resource selection functions (RSF) we examined how variation in the spatial extent of availability affected our interpretation of habitat selection by grizzly bears inhabiting mountain and plateau landscapes. We estimated separate models for females and males using three spatial extents: within the study area, within the home range, and within predetermined movement buffers. We employed two methods for evaluating the effects of scale on our RSF designs. First, we chose a priori six candidate models, estimated at each scale, and ranked them using Akaike Information Criteria. Using this method, results changed among scales for males but not for females. For female bears, models that included the full suite of covariates predicted habitat use best at ...