Influence of biotic and abiotic factors on home range size and shape of invasive wild pigs (Sus scrofa)

Abstract

BACKGROUND Determining factors influencing animal movements at a temporal scale that is similar to that at which management actions are conducted (e.g., weekly) is crucial for identifying efficient methods of wildlife conservation and management. Using GPS data from 49 wild pigs in the southeastern U.S., we constructed weekly 50% and 95% utilization distributions to quantify the effects of biotic and abiotic factors on weekly core area and home range size, as well as home range shape. RESULTS We found vegetative composition (i.e., proportion of bottomland hardwoods), season (based on forage availability), meteorological conditions (i.e., temperature and pressure), and sex influenced wild pig weekly home range and core area size, while vegetative composition (i.e., proportion of upland pines) and landscape features (i.e., distance to streams) also were important factors influencing home range shape. At close distances to streams, wild pigs had more elongate home ranges when their home ranges comprised less upland pine habitat; however, farther from streams, there was no change in home range shape across fluctuating proportions of upland pines. CONCLUSION These results demonstrate that fine-scale wild pig home ranges and movements are pliable from week to week and influenced by several habitat, landscape, and meteorological attributes that can easily be quantified from available land use and meteorological databases. These findings are important for designing monitoring studies, identifying high risk zones for disease transmission, planning response to disease emergence events, and allowing more effective and efficient short-term management planning. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved