Abstract
Wildlife managers adjust harvest quotas based on population changes and specific management goals, like controlling population size and demography or minimizing human-�wildlife interactions. However, establishing quotas that best meet these goals can be challenging due to e.g. population fluctuations, climate change, and bias or variation in harvest effort. High-Arctic Svalbard reindeer Rangifer tarandus platyrhynchus experience strong interannual variation in population size and demographic structure due to environmental stochasticity. Here, we analyzed the demographic and spatial bias of reindeer harvest in relation to quota regulations, hunter preferences, and population dynamics. Despite the protective management goal to avoid demographic impacts, 30 yr of data revealed that the harvest was consistently biased towards yearlings and male adults. This hunting selectivity resulted from both hunter preferences and the coarse license categories separating ‘calf’, ‘yearling or female adult’, and ‘free choice’ licenses. We developed Bayesian multinomial likelihood models to account for hunting selectivity and optimize annual quota distributions among license categories using population monitoring data. Optimized annual quota distributions varied strongly due to demographic fluctuations associated with strong climate variability, whereas simulated harvest offtakes showed that the protective management goal is inherently challenged by the coarse license categories. Although on average, only 7% of the hunted population was harvested annually, we found strong spatial variation in harvest pressure, with potential implications for spatial population dynamics. Our adaptive management approach accounting for hunting selectivity and demographic fluctuations can be of general relevance for harvested species in stochastic environments.
Highlights
Obtaining sustainable harvest strategies is often challenged by complex ecological processes as well as human interactions with wildlife and the environment, driven by social, cultural, political, and economic values
Management authorities use selective harvesting regimes to direct hunter effort so that both the harvest offtake and the post-harvest population size, structure, and expected growth rate harmonize with management goals
It is endemic to Sval-In this study, we evaluated the harvest practice of Svalbard reindeer and the compliance between management goals and practice
Summary
Obtaining sustainable harvest strategies is often challenged by complex ecological processes as well as human interactions with wildlife and the environment, driven by social, cultural, political, and economic values. It has been suggested that protected area for reindeer In this region, the landthe overall harvest has so far had no evident impact scape is moderately glaciated and characterized by on the population growth rate (Stien et al 2012a), mountains (up to 1200 m a.s.l.), broad u-shaped valcompliance with the strict management goals, leys, and side valleys with wetland, ridge, and heath hunting selectivity, and spatial variation in the har- vegetation (Elvebakk 2005). To on-snow events leading to ice-locked pastures can avoid strong demographic bias in the harvest offtake, cause high mortality due to starvation, the annual quota is split into 3 license categories: among juveniles and senescent individuals, and low calf, yearling/female adult (hereafter termed Y/FA), calf production the following summer Spatial heterogeneity in climate change effects (Hansen et al 2019b)
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