Print PageAnthropogenic effects on wildlife are typically assessed at the local level, but how such studies might generalize to other areas or spatial scales is difficult to determine. Macro-level occupancy studies are thus needed in order to assess impacts of multiple disturbance factors that might themselves vary over different geographic scales. Here we provide an exemplar study system that accounts for anthropogenic effects on multispecies mammal occupancy and distribution within the Appalachian Trail (AT) corridor that extends across a broad section of the eastern United States. Utilizing camera traps and a large volunteer network we were able to sample 447 sites along a 1024 km section of the AT to assess the effects of available habitat, hunting, recreation, and roads on eight different mammal species.
Results/Conclusions
Occupancy modeling revealed the importance of available habitat to all species except deer. Hunting was the second strongest predictor of occupancy for four mammal species, negatively influencing bears, bobcats, and deer, while positively influencing opossums. Modeling also indicated an avoidance of high trail use areas by deer and bears. Roads had the lowest predictive power on species occupancy in the corridor and were only significant for coyotes and deer. Our study represents broad-scale integration of local-scale anthropogenic pattern data. The resulting occupancy trends found at this regional scale stress the importance of including anthropogenic influences in future distribution modeling. Management should consider these human impacts and their potential combined influence on wildlife persistence with the AT corridor.
