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Title: Ranging behaviours across ecological and anthropogenic disturbance gradients: a pan-African perspective of giraffe ( Giraffa spp . ) space use

Animal movement behaviours are shaped by diverse factors, including resource availability and human impacts on the landscape. We generated home range estimates and daily movement rate estimates for 148 giraffe (Giraffaspp.) from all four species across Africa to evaluate the effects of environmental productivity and anthropogenic disturbance on space use. Using the continuous time movement modelling framework and a novel application of mixed effects meta-regression, we summarized overall giraffe space use and tested for the effects of resource availability and human impact on 95% autocorrelated kernel density estimate (AKDE) size and daily movement. The mean 95% AKDE was 356.4 km2and the mean daily movement was 14.1 km, both with marginally significant differences across species. We found significant negative effects of resource availability, and significant positive effects of resource heterogeneity and protected area overlap on 95% AKDE size. There were significant negative effects of overall anthropogenic disturbance and positive effects of the heterogeneity of anthropogenic disturbance on daily movements and 95% AKDE size. Our results provide unique insights into the interactive effects of resource availability and anthropogenic development on the movements of a large-bodied browser and highlight the potential impacts of rapidly changing landscapes on animal space-use patterns.

 
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Award ID(s):
1915347
NSF-PAR ID:
10475678
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; more » ; ; ; ; « less
Publisher / Repository:
The Royal Society
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Volume:
290
Issue:
2001
ISSN:
0962-8452
Page Range / eLocation ID:
20230912
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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