Black Bear Behavior and Movements Are Not Definitive Measures of Anthropogenic Food Use.

Autor: Hardeman DW Jr; Department of Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, University of Florida, 110 Newins-Ziegler Hall, Gainesville, FL 32611-0430, USA.; Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, 1105 Southwest Williston Road, Gainesville, FL 32601-9044, USA., Vander Zanden HB; Department of Biology, University of Florida, P.O. Box 118525, Gainesville, FL 32611-8525, USA., McCown JW; Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, 1105 Southwest Williston Road, Gainesville, FL 32601-9044, USA., Scheick BK; Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, 1105 Southwest Williston Road, Gainesville, FL 32601-9044, USA., McCleery RA; Department of Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, University of Florida, 110 Newins-Ziegler Hall, Gainesville, FL 32611-0430, USA.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: Animals : an open access journal from MDPI [Animals (Basel)] 2023 Mar 06; Vol. 13 (5). Date of Electronic Publication: 2023 Mar 06.
DOI: 10.3390/ani13050950
Abstrakt: Increasing human-bear conflicts are a growing concern, and managers often assume bears in developed areas are food-conditioned. We examined the relationship between human-bear conflicts and food conditioning by analyzing isotopic values of hair from black bears ( Ursus americanus floridanus ) involved in research ( n = 34) and conflicts ( n = 45). We separated research bears into wild and developed subgroups based on the impervious surface within their home ranges and separated conflict bears based on observations of human food consumption ( anthropogenic = observations; management = no observations). We initially assumed wild bears were not food conditioned and anthropogenic bears were. However, using isotopic values, we classified 79% of anthropogenic bears and 8% of wild bears as food conditioned. Next, we assigned these bears to the appropriate food conditioned category and used the categorizations as a training set to classify developed and management bears. We estimated that 53% of management bears and 20% of developed bears were food conditioned. Only 60% of bears captured within or using developed areas showed evidence of food conditioning. We also found that δ13C values were a better predictor of anthropogenic foods in a bear's diet than δ15N values. Our results indicate that bears in developed areas are not necessarily food conditioned and caution against management actions based on limited observations of bear behavior.
Databáze: MEDLINE
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