title: Species-Specific Responses of Carnivores to Human-Induced Landscape Changes in Central Argentina.
abstract: The role that mammalian carnivores play in ecosystems can be deeply altered by human-driven habitat disturbance. While most carnivore species are negatively affected, the impact of habitat changes is expected to depend on their ecological flexibility. We aimed to identify key factors affecting the habitat use by four sympatric carnivore species in landscapes of central Argentina. Camera trapping surveys were carried out at 49 sites from 2011 to 2013. Each site was characterized by 12 habitat attributes, including human disturbance and fragmentation. Four landscape gradients were created from Principal Component Analysis and their influence on species-specific habitat use was studied using Generalized Linear Models. We recorded 74 events of Conepatus chinga, 546 of Pseudalopex gymnocercus, 193 of Leopardus geoffroyi and 45 of Puma concolor. We found that the gradient describing sites away from urban settlements and with low levels of disturbance had the strongest influence. L. geoffroyi was the only species responding significantly to the four gradients and showing a positive response to modified habitats, which could be favored by the low level of persecution by humans. P. concolor made stronger use of most preserved sites with low proportion of cropland, even though the species also used sites with an intermediate level of fragmentation. A more flexible use of space was found for C. chinga and P. gymnocercus. Our results demonstrate that the impact of human activities spans across this guild of carnivores and that species-specific responses appear to be mediated by ecological and behavioral attributes.
authors.affiliation: Grupo de Ecología Comportamental de Mamíferos (GECM), Cátedra de Fisiología Animal, Departamento de Biología, Bioquímica y Farmacia, Universidad Nacional del Sur, Bahía Blanca, Argentina.|Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Buenos Aires, Argentina.
authors.forename: Nicolás
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Caruso
authors.affiliation: Grupo de Ecología Comportamental de Mamíferos (GECM), Cátedra de Fisiología Animal, Departamento de Biología, Bioquímica y Farmacia, Universidad Nacional del Sur, Bahía Blanca, Argentina.|Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Buenos Aires, Argentina.
authors.forename: Mauro
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lucherini
authors.affiliation: Département de biologie and Centre d'étude de la forêt, Département de Biologie, Université Laval, Québec, Canada.
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Fortin
authors.affiliation: Grupo de Ecología Comportamental de Mamíferos (GECM), Cátedra de Fisiología Animal, Departamento de Biología, Bioquímica y Farmacia, Universidad Nacional del Sur, Bahía Blanca, Argentina.|Instituto de Ciencias Biológicas y Biomédicas del Sur (INBIOSUR), Universidad Nacional del Sur and Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Bahía Blanca, Argentina.
authors.forename: Emma B
authors.initials: EB
authors.lastname: Casanave
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001118:Argentina; D060435:Carnivory; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D055669:Ecological and Environmental Phenomena; D017753:Ecosystem; D006802:Human Activities; D006801:Humans; D013045:Species Specificity