Gait Patterns in Snow—a Possible Criterion to Differentiate Sika Deer and Japanese Serow Tracks

Abstract

There is a compelling need to develop user-friendly and sensitive techniques to monitor sika deer (Cervus nippon) populations in snowy regions, where initial stages of deer invasion have been observed. In snow, we can easily detect footsteps of terrestrial mammals, which often serve as a useful index of population size. Here, we examined the possibility of identifying tracks with similar hoof prints left by two sympatric ungulates, sika deer and Japanese serow (Capricornis crispus), using gait patterns. We then recorded tracks of free-ranging deer and serows on the snow by following ∼200-km survey routes in the Tohoku region. We successfully recorded the gait patterns of 27 deer and 34 serows. Our key findings were as follows: 1) the step width of deer tracks (mean and SE, 20.3 ± 0.7 cm) was substantially narrower than that of serow tracks (26.9 ± 0.8 cm); 2) step width was less sensitive to body size and ground conditions for both species; and 3) the step width of 22.5 cm became an optimal threshold to maintain a reasonable classification accuracy (> 80%) for both species. Thus, the gait patterns serve as a possible criterion for identifying the tracks of these two ungulates.