title: Implications of Harvest on the Boundaries of Protected Areas for Large Carnivore Viewing Opportunities.
abstract: The desire to see free ranging large carnivores in their natural habitat is a driver of tourism in protected areas around the globe. However, large carnivores are wide-ranging and subject to human-caused mortality outside protected area boundaries. The impact of harvest (trapping or hunting) on wildlife viewing opportunities has been the subject of intense debate and speculation, but quantitative analyses have been lacking. We examined the effect of legal harvest of wolves (Canis lupus) along the boundaries of two North American National Parks, Denali (DNPP) and Yellowstone (YNP), on wolf viewing opportunities within the parks during peak tourist season. We used data on wolf sightings, pack sizes, den site locations, and harvest adjacent to DNPP from 1997-2013 and YNP from 2008-2013 to evaluate the relationship between harvest and wolf viewing opportunities. Although sightings were largely driven by wolf population size and proximity of den sites to roads, sightings in both parks were significantly reduced by harvest. Sightings in YNP increased by 45% following years with no harvest of a wolf from a pack, and sightings in DNPP were more than twice as likely during a period with a harvest buffer zone than in years without the buffer. These findings show that harvest of wolves adjacent to protected areas can reduce sightings within those areas despite minimal impacts on the size of protected wolf populations. Consumptive use of carnivores adjacent to protected areas may therefore reduce their potential for non-consumptive use, and these tradeoffs should be considered when developing regional wildlife management policies.
authors.affiliation: University of Alaska Fairbanks, Institute of Arctic Biology, 323 Murie Building, Fairbanks, Alaska 99775, United States of America.|National Park Service, Denali National Park and Preserve, P.O. Box 9, Denali Park, Alaska 99755, United States of America.
authors.forename: Bridget L
authors.initials: BL
authors.lastname: Borg
authors.affiliation: National Park Service, Denali National Park and Preserve, P.O. Box 9, Denali Park, Alaska 99755, United States of America.
authors.forename: Stephen M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Arthur
authors.affiliation: National Park Service, Denali National Park and Preserve, P.O. Box 9, Denali Park, Alaska 99755, United States of America.
authors.forename: Nicholas A
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Bromen
authors.affiliation: National Park Service, Yellowstone Center for Resources, Wolf Project, P.O. Box 168, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming 82190, United States of America.
authors.forename: Kira A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Cassidy
authors.affiliation: National Park Service, Yellowstone Center for Resources, Wolf Project, P.O. Box 168, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming 82190, United States of America.
authors.forename: Rick
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: McIntyre
authors.affiliation: National Park Service, Yellowstone Center for Resources, Wolf Project, P.O. Box 168, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming 82190, United States of America.
authors.forename: Douglas W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.affiliation: University of Alaska Fairbanks, Institute of Arctic Biology, 323 Murie Building, Fairbanks, Alaska 99775, United States of America.|University of Washington, School of Environmental and Forest Sciences, Box 352100, Seattle Washington 98195, United States of America.
authors.forename: Laura R
authors.initials: LR
authors.lastname: Prugh
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000835:Animals, Wild; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D017753:Ecosystem; D006802:Human Activities; D006801:Humans; D011156:Population Density; D019596:Wolves