COS 246-6 - Human-driven landscape changes and species traits shape mammal communities across North American ecoregions

Thursday, August 18, 2022

2:45 PM – 3:00 PM EDT

Presenting Author(s)

JH

Jeffrey D. Haight

Arizona State University, United States

Coauthor(s)

SH

Sharon J. Hall

Arizona State University, United States
SA

Solny A. Adalsteinsson

Washington University in St. Louis, United States
AA

Adam A. Ahlers

Kansas State University, United States
JA

Julia Angstmann

Butler University, United States
WA

Whitney J. Anthonysamy

University of Health Sciences and Pharmacy, United States
EB

Elizabeth Biro

Washington University in St. Louis, United States
BD

Barbara Dugleby

St. Edward's University, United States
MF

Mason Fidino

Lincoln Park Zoo, United States
TG

Travis Gallo

George Mason University, United States
AG

Austin M. Green

University of Utah
Salt Lake City, UT, United States
LH

Laurel Hartley

University of Colorado-Denver
Denver, CO, United States
MJ

Mark J. Jordan

Seattle University, United States
CK

Cria A. Kay

Lincoln Park Zoo, United States
EL

Elizabeth W. Lehrer

Lincoln Park Zoo, United States
RL

Robert A. Long

Woodland Park Zoo, United States
BM

Brandon MacDougall

University of Iowa, United States
SM

Seth B. Magle

Lincoln Park Zoo, United States
DM

Darren Minier

Oakland Zoo, United States
CM

Chris Mowry

The Atlanta Coyote Project, United States
MM

Maureen Murray

Lincoln Park Zoo, United States
KN

Kristina Nininger

Central Florida Zoo and Botanic Gardens, United States
MP

Mary E. Pendergast

Wild Utah Project, United States
KR

Katie R. Remine

Woodland Park Zoo, United States
TR

Travis Ryan

Butler University, United States
CS

Carmen Salsbury

Butler University, United States
CS

Christopher J. Schell, PhD

University of California - Berkeley, United States
CS

Cagan H. Sekercioglu

University of Utah
Salt Lake City, UT, United States
CS

Catherine J. Shier

City of Edmonton, United States
KS

Kelly C. Simon

Texas Parks and Wildlife, United States
CS

Colleen C. St. Clair

University of Alberta
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
TS

Theodore Stankowich

California State University - Long Beach, United States
CS

Cassondra J. Stevenson

University of Alberta, Canada
DW

Dave Will

Seneca Park Zoo, United States
JW

Jacque Williamson

Brandywine Zoo, United States
LW

Larry Wilson

The Atlanta Coyote Project, United States
AZ

Amanda J. Zellmer

Occidental College; Arroyos & Foothills Conservancy, United States
JL

Jesse S. Lewis

Arizona State University, United States

Background/Question/Methods

Human-driven environmental changes shape ecological communities from local to global scales. In cities, landscape patterns in the built environment generally drive the diversity of wildlife species, but local community responses may also be shaped by larger-scale dynamic factors that vary across cities at regional to continental scales, including species pools and environmental conditions such as climate, vegetation, water availability, and urban growth patterns. In partnership with the Urban Wildlife Information Network (UWIN), we used remote camera data from 20 North American metropolitan areas to construct multi-region, multi-species occupancy models to evaluate the importance of species traits (body size and carnivory) and ecoregional characteristics (temperature, vegetation productivity, urban intensity, natural patch density, and city age) in estimating response of wildlife species presence and diversity to human development.

Results/Conclusions

Supporting our prediction that both the amount and configuration of natural habitat areas would affect community characteristics, we found that the occupancy and species diversity of the 37 native mammal species studied declined with increasing urban land cover but increased with a greater density of natural area patches. As well, larger-bodied species were most strongly and negatively impacted by urbanization across cities. Two regional environmental variables – temperature and vegetation productivity – were found to substantially influence relationships between urbanization and species diversity and occupancy. Mammal species occupancy and diversity were more negatively associated with urban intensity in warmer cities and in cities with lower overall productivity, highlighting how synergies between changing climate and urbanization may produce variable ecological consequences. By testing the scalability of relationships between landscape heterogeneity and wildlife community composition, these results also provide general insight into how broad environmental factors may interact across multiple spatial scales to support biodiversity in ever-changing human-dominated systems.