Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents
Animal carcasses provide an ephemeral pulse of nutrients for scavengers that utilize them. Carcass sites can increase species interactions and/or ephemeral, localized landscapes of fear for prey within the vicinity. Few studies have applied the landscape of fear to carcasses. Here we use a mass die-...
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ftzenodo:oai:zenodo.org:3860802 2024-09-15T18:31:47+00:00 Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents Frank, Shane Blaalid, Rakel Mayer, Martin Zedrosser, Andreas Steyaert, Sam 2020-05-27 https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.tx95x69sc unknown Zenodo https://zenodo.org/communities/dryad https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.tx95x69sc oai:zenodo.org:3860802 info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess Creative Commons Zero v1.0 Universal https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode mass mortality carcass decomposition fear ecology Rodents scavengers Corvus corvax Rangifer tarandus info:eu-repo/semantics/other 2020 ftzenodo https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.tx95x69sc 2024-07-26T12:58:09Z Animal carcasses provide an ephemeral pulse of nutrients for scavengers that utilize them. Carcass sites can increase species interactions and/or ephemeral, localized landscapes of fear for prey within the vicinity. Few studies have applied the landscape of fear to carcasses. Here we use a mass die-off of reindeer caused by lightning in Norway to test whether rodents avoided larger scavengers (e.g. corvids and fox). We used the presence and abundance of faeces as a proxy for carcass use over the course of two years and found that rodents showed the strongest avoidance towards changes in raven abundance ( β = -0.469, SE = 0.231, p -value = 0.0429), but not fox, presumably due to greater predation risk imposed by large droves of raven. Moreover, the emergence of rodent occurrence within the carcass area corresponded well with the disappearance of raven during the second year of the study. We suggest that carcasses have the potential to shape the landscape of fear for prey, but that the overall effects of carcasses on individual fitness and populations of species ultimately depends on the carcass regime, e.g., carcass size, count, and areal extent, frequency, and the scavenger guild. We discuss conservation implications and how carcass provisioning and landscapes of fear could be potentially used to manage populations and ecosystems, but that there is a gap in understanding that must first be bridged. Other/Unknown Material Rangifer tarandus Zenodo |
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mass mortality carcass decomposition fear ecology Rodents scavengers Corvus corvax Rangifer tarandus |
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mass mortality carcass decomposition fear ecology Rodents scavengers Corvus corvax Rangifer tarandus Frank, Shane Blaalid, Rakel Mayer, Martin Zedrosser, Andreas Steyaert, Sam Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents |
topic_facet |
mass mortality carcass decomposition fear ecology Rodents scavengers Corvus corvax Rangifer tarandus |
description |
Animal carcasses provide an ephemeral pulse of nutrients for scavengers that utilize them. Carcass sites can increase species interactions and/or ephemeral, localized landscapes of fear for prey within the vicinity. Few studies have applied the landscape of fear to carcasses. Here we use a mass die-off of reindeer caused by lightning in Norway to test whether rodents avoided larger scavengers (e.g. corvids and fox). We used the presence and abundance of faeces as a proxy for carcass use over the course of two years and found that rodents showed the strongest avoidance towards changes in raven abundance ( β = -0.469, SE = 0.231, p -value = 0.0429), but not fox, presumably due to greater predation risk imposed by large droves of raven. Moreover, the emergence of rodent occurrence within the carcass area corresponded well with the disappearance of raven during the second year of the study. We suggest that carcasses have the potential to shape the landscape of fear for prey, but that the overall effects of carcasses on individual fitness and populations of species ultimately depends on the carcass regime, e.g., carcass size, count, and areal extent, frequency, and the scavenger guild. We discuss conservation implications and how carcass provisioning and landscapes of fear could be potentially used to manage populations and ecosystems, but that there is a gap in understanding that must first be bridged. |
format |
Other/Unknown Material |
author |
Frank, Shane Blaalid, Rakel Mayer, Martin Zedrosser, Andreas Steyaert, Sam |
author_facet |
Frank, Shane Blaalid, Rakel Mayer, Martin Zedrosser, Andreas Steyaert, Sam |
author_sort |
Frank, Shane |
title |
Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents |
title_short |
Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents |
title_full |
Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents |
title_fullStr |
Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents |
title_full_unstemmed |
Fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents |
title_sort |
fear the reaper: ungulate carcasses may generate an ephemeral landscape of fear for rodents |
publisher |
Zenodo |
publishDate |
2020 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.tx95x69sc |
genre |
Rangifer tarandus |
genre_facet |
Rangifer tarandus |
op_relation |
https://zenodo.org/communities/dryad https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.tx95x69sc oai:zenodo.org:3860802 |
op_rights |
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess Creative Commons Zero v1.0 Universal https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.tx95x69sc |
_version_ |
1810473530343555072 |