Abstract
Controlling infectious diseases at the wildlife/livestock interface is often difficult because the ecological processes driving transmission between wildlife reservoirs and sympatric livestock populations are poorly understood. Thus, assessing how animals use their environment and how this affects interspecific interactions is an important factor in determining the local risk for disease transmission and maintenance. We used data from concurrently monitored GPS-collared domestic cattle and wild boar (Sus scrofa) to assess spatiotemporal interactions and associated implications for bovine tuberculosis (TB) transmission in a complex ecological and epidemiological system, Doñana National Park (DNP, South Spain). We found that fine-scale spatial overlap of cattle and wild boar was seasonally high in some habitats. In general, spatial interactions between the two species were highest in the marsh-shrub ecotone and at permanent water sources, whereas shrub-woodlands and seasonal grass-marshlands were areas with lower predicted relative interactions. Wild boar and cattle generally used different resources during winter and spring in DNP. Conversely, limited differences in resource selection during summer and autumn, when food and water availability were limiting, resulted in negligible spatial segregation and thus probably high encounter rates. The spatial gradient in potential overlap between the two species across DNP corresponded well with the spatial variation in the observed incidence of TB in cattle and prevalence of TB in wild boar. We suggest that the marsh-shrub ecotone and permanent water sources act as important points of TB transmission in our system, particularly during summer and autumn. Targeted management actions are suggested to reduce potential interactions between cattle and wild boar in order to prevent disease transmission and design effective control strategies.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13567-014-0122-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Most pathogens of concern to livestock are able to crossinfect multiple host species, including wildlife, and in areas where wildlife and livestock co-occur, pathogens can emerge and establish in these sympatric host populations [1]
Collared wild boar were distributed across all five cattle management areas, whereas collared cattle were only present in BR and MA (Figure 1)
Overall, > 60% of wild boar HR overlapped areas used by cattle, whereas ≤ 40% of the HR of cattle overlapped areas used by wild boar
Summary
Most pathogens of concern to livestock are able to crossinfect multiple host species, including wildlife, and in areas where wildlife and livestock co-occur (i.e. interface areas), pathogens can emerge and establish in these sympatric host populations [1]. Foot and mouth disease, rabies, anthrax, brucellosis and bovine tuberculosis (TB) have all been shown to be reciprocally transmissible between livestock and wildlife [2,3,4,5,6]. In this context, the demography and behaviour of the hosts’ populations can play an important role in intra- and interspecific pathogen transmission by determining contact rates. Epidemiological studies at the interface between livestock and important diseasecarrying wildlife, such as wild boar, remain scarce
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