Genetic Monitoring of Grey Wolves in Latvia Shows Adverse Reproductive and Social Consequences of Hunting

Žunna, Agrita; Ruņģis, Dainis Edgars; Ozoliņš, Jānis; Stepanova, Alda; Done, Gundega

doi:10.3390/biology12091255

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 63 publications

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“…Our results demonstrated a pessimistic situation that nearly one-third of Amur tiger individuals have either a high or medium inbreeding coefficient in this isolated population, including four high inbreeding individuals, posing a more severe inbreeding predicament than that observed in African lions and grey wolves 78 , 79 . The mean kinship coefficient among individuals in this small and isolated population was 0.0868, which was higher than that of the bighorn sheep ( Ovis canadensis ) 80 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 56%

The genetic status and rescue measure for a geographically isolated population of Amur tigers

Ning,

Liu,

et al. 2024

Sci Rep

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The Amur tiger is currently confronted with challenges of anthropogenic development, leading to its population becoming fragmented into two geographically isolated groups: smaller and larger ones. Small and isolated populations frequently face a greater extinction risk, yet the small tiger population’s genetic status and survival potential have not been assessed. Here, a total of 210 samples of suspected Amur tiger feces were collected from this small population, and the genetic background and population survival potentials were assessed by using 14 microsatellite loci. Our results demonstrated that the mean number of alleles in all loci was 3.7 and expected heterozygosity was 0.6, indicating a comparatively lower level of population genetic diversity compared to previously reported studies on other subspecies. The genetic estimates of effective population size (Ne) and the Ne/N ratio were merely 7.6 and 0.152, respectively, representing lower values in comparison to the Amur tiger population in Sikhote-Alin (the larger group). However, multiple methods have indicated the possibility of genetic divergence within our isolated population under study. Meanwhile, the maximum kinship recorded was 0.441, and the mean inbreeding coefficient stood at 0.0868, both of which are higher than those observed in other endangered species, such as the African lion and the grey wolf. Additionally, we have identified a significant risk of future extinction if the lethal equivalents were to reach 6.26, which is higher than that of other large carnivores. Further, our simulation results indicated that an increase in the number of breeding females would enhance the prospects of this population. In summary, our findings provide a critical theoretical basis for further bailout strategies concerning Amur tigers.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 56%

The genetic status and rescue measure for a geographically isolated population of Amur tigers

Ning,

Liu,

et al. 2024

Sci Rep

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“…The side effects of these management practices are often claimed to undermine the efficiency of lethal control or even to create more damages (Elbroch and Treves, 2023). In the specific case of social canids like wolves, studies have mostly pointed out additive human-caused breeder loss as a risk for increasing damages on livestock (Jęodrzejewska et al, 1996;Žunna et al, 2023). Social instability can indeed cause multiple reproduction (Ausband et al, 2017) or pack disruption (Cassidy et al, 2023), although their effects on damages have not been assessed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatio-temporal dynamics of attacks around deaths of wolves: A statistical assessment of lethal control efficiency in France

Grente,

Opitz,

Duchamp

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Evaluating the efficiency of lethal control of large carnivores such as wolves to reduce attacks on livestock is important given the controversy surrounding this measure. We used retrospective data over 10 years and an intra-site comparison approach to evaluate the effects of lethal control on the distribution of attack intensities in the French Alps. We analyzed 278 legal killings of wolves between 2011 and 2020 and the 6110 attacks that occurred during a period of ± 90 days and within 10 km around these lethal removals. This large number of attacks allowed us to perform an original framework that combined both continuous spatial and temporal scales through 3D kernel estimation. We also controlled the analysis for livestock presence, and explored different analysis subsets of removals in relation to their locations, dates and proximity to other removals. This statistical method provided an efficient visualization of attack intensity spatio-temporal distribution before and after removals. A decrease of the intensity of attacks was the most common result after the lethal removals of wolves. However, this outcome was not systematic for all subsets and depended on the scale of the analysis. In addition, attacks tended to persist after removals while showing frequent interruptions in time after but also before removals. We also observed localized positive trends of attack intensities at varying distances from removals after they occurred. To summarize, our results showed that considering the scale of the analysis is crucial and that effects should be analyzed separately for each local context. As a next step, we recommend to move forward from patterns to mechanisms by linking the effects of lethal control on wolves to their effects on attacks through analysis of fine-scaled data on wolves and livestock.

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The effects of human‐caused mortality on mammalian cooperative breeders: a synthesis

Ausband,

Rebholz,

Petrillo

2024

Biological Reviews

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Human‐caused mortality can be pervasive and even highly selective for individuals in groups of cooperative breeders. Many studies of cooperative breeders, however, do not address human‐caused mortality. Similarly, studies focused on the effects of human‐caused mortality on wildlife populations often do not consider the ecology of cooperative breeders. We searched the literature and identified 58 studies where human‐caused mortality affected a group characteristic, vital rate, or population state of a cooperative breeder. Of studies reporting population growth or decline, 80% reported a link between human‐caused mortality and population declines in cooperative breeders. Such studies often did not identify the mechanism behind population declines, but 28% identified concurrent declines in adult survival and another 21% reported concurrent declines in recruitment or reproduction. There was little overlap between the cooperative breeding and human‐caused mortality literatures, limiting our ability to accrue knowledge. Future work would be beneficial if it (i) identified the vital rate(s) causing population declines, (ii) leveraged management actions such as lethal removal to ask questions about the ecology of group‐living in cooperative breeders, and (iii) used insights from cooperative breeding theory to inform management actions and conservation of group‐living species.

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Genetic Monitoring of Grey Wolves in Latvia Shows Adverse Reproductive and Social Consequences of Hunting

Cited by 3 publications

References 63 publications

The genetic status and rescue measure for a geographically isolated population of Amur tigers

The genetic status and rescue measure for a geographically isolated population of Amur tigers

Spatio-temporal dynamics of attacks around deaths of wolves: A statistical assessment of lethal control efficiency in France

The effects of human‐caused mortality on mammalian cooperative breeders: a synthesis

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