Human presence and infrastructure impact wildlife nocturnality differently across an assemblage of mammalian species

Abstract

Wildlife species may shift towards more nocturnal behavior in areas of higher human influence, but it is unclear how consistent this shift might be. We investigated how humans impact large mammal diel activities in a heavily recreated protected area and an adjacent university-managed forest in southwest British Columbia, Canada. We used camera trap detections of humans and wildlife, along with data on land-use infrastructure (e.g., recreation trails and restricted-access roads), in Bayesian regression models to investigate impacts of human disturbance on wildlife nocturnality. We found moderate evidence that black bears (Ursus americanus) were more nocturnal in response to human detections (mean posterior estimate = 0.35, 90% credible interval = 0.04 to 0.65), but no other clear relationships between wildlife nocturnality and human detections. However, we found evidence that coyotes (Canis latrans) (estimates = 0.81, 95% CI = 0.46 to 1.17) were more nocturnal and snowshoe hares (Lepus americanus) (estimate = -0.87, 95% CI = -1.29 to -0.46) were less nocturnal in areas of higher trail density. We also found that coyotes (estimate = -0.87, 95% CI = -1.29 to -0.46) and cougars (Puma concolor) (estimate = -1.14, 90% CI = -2.16 to -0.12) were less nocturnal in areas of greater road density. Furthermore, coyotes, black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus), and snowshoe hares were moderately more nocturnal in areas near urban-wildland boundaries (estimates and 90% CIs: coyote = -0.29, -0.55 to -0.04, black-tailed deer = -0.25, -0.45 to -0.04, snowshoe hare = -0.24, -0.46 to -0.01). Our findings imply anthropogenic landscape features may influence medium to large-sized mammal diel activities more than direct human presence. While increased nocturnality may be a promising mechanism for human-wildlife coexistence, shifts in temporal activity can also have negative repercussions for wildlife, warranting further research into the causes and consequences of wildlife responses to increasingly human-dominated landscapes.

How climate change and population growth will shape attendance and human-wildlife interactions at British Columbia parks

“…Other species such as wolves (Canis lupus) or caribou (Rangifer tarandus tarandus) tend to avoid or change their behaviour in areas where humans recreate (Gill et al, under review;Rogala et al, 2011), which would result in a reduction in HWIs with rising park attendance. Future research should aim to identify the effects of increasing visitor volumes across species (e.g., Procko et al, 2023).…”

“…Guest volume is a pressing issue for park managers, as it strains operations and reduces the quality of the visitor experience (Manning, 2001;Prakash et al, 2019). The presence and behaviour of humans in protected areas can negatively impact wildlife through increased zoonotic disease transmission (Charron, 2002;Monahan et al, 2009), a loss of biodiversity (Nyhus, 2016), altered spatiotemporal patterns in habitat use, including habitat loss through avoidance, behavioural change (e.g., conditioning, tolerance, predator shield;Lopez Gutierrez et al, 2020;Procko et al, 2023), and changes in energetics (Corradini et al, 2021;Gaynor et al, 2018;Larson et al, 2016;Reed & Merenlender, 2008;Rogala et al, 2011;Sarmento & Berger, 2017;Whittington et al, 2022). Human sourced food and salts also act as attractants for many species, generating human-wildlife-interactions (HWIs) that can result in the destruction of individual animals (Hebblewhite et al, 2003;Vayro et al, 2023).…”

Quantifying impacts of recreation on elk (Cervus canadensis) using novel modeling approaches

“…A 30-min independence threshold is common in most wildlife studies (Burton et al, 2015). We used the 1-min threshold for human detections because numerous independent recreationists are likely to use high-traffic trails within the larger 30-min window (Procko et al, 2022(Procko et al, , 2023. This method may have slightly underestimated visitors, as multiple individuals were recorded as a single detection event if they all pass the camera within 1 min of each other.…”

“…Human activity is widely recognized to influence wildlife diel activity patterns (Gaynor et al, 2018;Nickel et al, 2020). However, prior studies have indicated that the choice of how to characterize human activity-as a categorical or continuous variable-may impact results (Dertien et al, 2021;Procko et al, 2023). Therefore, we used two analyses to test whether elk adjust their diel activity patterns (i.e., hours of activity) to become more nocturnal in areas of higher recreation.…”

Native prey, not landscape change or novel prey, drive cougar (Puma concolor) distribution at a boreal forest range edge

“…We sought to determine the best‐supported factors driving cougar occurrence in the boreal using camera traps (Burton et al., 2015). Camera traps are a useful tool for studying elusive, far‐ranging mammals that live in low densities and have been used effectively for cougars (Alexander & Gese, 2018; Guarda et al., 2017; Loonam et al., 2021; Procko et al., 2022, 2023). We collected data from a camera array deployed at the edge of the cougar's northeastern range in Alberta, Canada, relative to the proposed expansion front.…”