Abstract
Environmental factors have strong influence on activity of alpine ungulates. However, the presence and activities of people in high mountains have been growing rapidly and have led to the advent of human-induced factors, which may modify the time budget. In this study, we examined the influence of natural and human-induced factors on the daytime budget of Tatra chamois Rupicapra rupicapra tatrica. On average, chamois spent 46% of their time foraging, 40% resting, 13% moving around and 1% on social behaviour. The amount of time devoted to particular categories of behaviour was influenced by the time of day, herd size, weather conditions and human disturbance. Human disturbance and the time of day had the highest effect on the proportion of foraging in the daytime budget, which increased as the day progressed and at greater distances from the nearest hiking trail. These two factors also increased the amount of time spent resting, which peaked during the afternoon hours and at greater distances from the nearest trail. The time spent moving around decreased with increasing herd size, distance from the nearest trail and as the day progressed. Males devoted less time to foraging and more to resting and moving around than females. The intensity of human-induced factors is particularly important for a population inhabiting a small, isolated area, as is the case with strictly high-mountain species.
Highlights
The amount of time individual animals allocate to mutually exclusive activities is known as their time budget
Tatra chamois spent an average of 45.7% of their daytime budget foraging (Fig. 2)
Another 40.0% of the time was spent resting and 12.8% on moving around; social behaviours accounted for only 1.5% of the daytime budget
Summary
The amount of time individual animals allocate to mutually exclusive activities is known as their time budget. In most species of social ungulates, males and females live separately except during the reproductive season (Côté et al 1997, Ruckstuhl & Neuhaus 2002, Singh et al 2010). This sex-dependent spatial segregation emerges from their different purposes in life: females are responsible for breeding success and raising young and males for reproductive success achieved by the transfer of genes best adapted to a given set of environmental conditions (Clutton-Brock et al 1987, Bon et al 1992, Pelletier 2005). The larger and stronger males may remain in habitats with superior food resources even when
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