On the causes and consequences of the free-roaming dog problem in southern Chile.

Autor: Silva-Rodríguez EA; Laboratorio de Fauna Silvestre & Laboratorio de Biodiversidad y Ecología del Dosel, Instituto de Conservación, Biodiversidad y Territorio, Facultad de Ciencias Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Universidad Austral de Chile, Casilla 567, Valdivia, Chile; Programa Austral Patagonia, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile. Electronic address: eduardo.silva@uach.cl., Cortés EI; Laboratorio de Fauna Silvestre & Laboratorio de Biodiversidad y Ecología del Dosel, Instituto de Conservación, Biodiversidad y Territorio, Facultad de Ciencias Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Universidad Austral de Chile, Casilla 567, Valdivia, Chile; Programa Austral Patagonia, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile; Programa de Magíster en Ciencias mención Bosques y Medio Ambiente, Escuela de Graduados, Facultad de Ciencias Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Universidad Austral de Chile, Casilla 567, Valdivia, Chile., Zambrano B; Laboratorio de Fauna Silvestre & Laboratorio de Biodiversidad y Ecología del Dosel, Instituto de Conservación, Biodiversidad y Territorio, Facultad de Ciencias Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Universidad Austral de Chile, Casilla 567, Valdivia, Chile; Centro de Investigación para la Sustentabilidad & Programa de Doctorado en Medicina de la Conservación, Facultad de Ciencias de la Vida, Universidad Andrés Bello, Chile; ONG, Unidad por la Conservación de los Ecosistemas, Valdivia, Chile., Naughton-Treves L; Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States of America., Farías AA; Departamento de Ecología & Gestión Ambiental, Centro Universitario Regional del Este (CURE-Maldonado), Universidad de la República, Maldonado, Uruguay; Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), P. Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: The Science of the total environment [Sci Total Environ] 2023 Sep 15; Vol. 891, pp. 164324. Date of Electronic Publication: 2023 May 23.
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.164324
Abstrakt: Free-roaming dogs are an important concern for public health, livestock production and the environment. Human behaviors-such as allowing pets to roam, abandoning dogs, or feeding stray animals-could influence free-roaming dog abundance and the frequency of occurrence of dog-caused problems. Here we aim to determine patterns of free-roaming dog abundance in urban and rural areas, to reveal spatial variation in human behaviors underlying the free-roaming dog problem, and to test for associations between free-roaming dog abundance and related problems. We conducted our study in Chile, where dogs are a major environmental issue. In Chile, as in many other Global South countries, many people leave their dogs to roam, partly due to norms and to lax enforcement of dog control laws. To address our objectives, we counted dogs in 213 transects in urban and rural areas to model dog abundance using N-mixture models. Then we conducted interviews in 553 properties around the transects to determine people's dog management, their behavior towards free-roaming dogs and the prevalence of dog-caused problems. Dog abundance was higher in transects where a higher number of owned dogs was allowed to roam, as well as in lower-income neighborhoods (based on property tax valuation). Meanwhile, rural citizens were more likely to let their dogs' roam. Dog abandonment was reported more frequently in lower-income urban neighborhoods and rural areas. Not surprisingly, we found that several problems-such as dog bites-were more frequent where we detected more free-roaming dogs. Our results highlight that the owned dog population is a central component of the free-roaming dog problem, and that human behavior is the key driver underlying the problem. Dog management programs should promote responsible dog-ownership, with a strong message focused on keeping dogs inside properties and preventing abandonment.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
(Copyright © 2023 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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