Abstract
Interactions between animal behaviour and the environment are both shaping observed habitat use. Despite the importance of inter-specific interactions on the habitat use performed by individuals, most previous analyses have focused on case studies of single species. By focusing on two sympatric populations of large herbivores with contrasting body size, we went one step beyond by studying variation in home range size and identifying the factors involved in such variation, to define how habitat features such as resource heterogeneity, resource quality, and openness created by hurricane or forest managers, and constraints may influence habitat use at the individual level. We found a large variability among individual's home range size in both species, particularly in summer. Season appeared as the most important factor accounting for observed variation in home range size. Regarding habitat features, we found that (i) the proportion of area damaged by the hurricane was the only habitat component that inversely influenced roe deer home range size, (ii) this habitat type also influenced both diurnal and nocturnal red deer home range sizes, (iii) home range size of red deer during the day was inversely influenced by the biomass of their preferred plants, as were both diurnal and nocturnal core areas of the red deer home range, and (iv) we do not find any effect of resource heterogeneity on home range size in any case. Our results suggest that a particular habitat type (i.e. areas damaged by hurricane) can be used by individuals of sympatric species because it brings both protected and dietary resources. Thus, it is necessary to maintain the openness of these areas and to keep animal density quite low as observed in these hunted populations to limit competition between these sympatric populations of herbivores.
Highlights
Habitat selection is a hierarchical process describing the capacity of individuals to choose a habitat that brings resources and conditions necessary for survival and reproduction, and is influenced by temporal and spatial environmental variations [1,2]
We found a great variability in home range size and core area size of both red deer and roe deer
Our study contributes to a better understanding of which habitat component influences red deer and roe deer home range size when these two species live in sympatry
Summary
Habitat selection is a hierarchical process describing the capacity of individuals to choose a habitat that brings resources and conditions necessary for survival and reproduction, and is influenced by temporal and spatial environmental variations [1,2]. This process involves a set of innate and acquired behavioural decisions, and is shaped by the interplay between habitat preferences of individuals and constraints that prevent them to make the best choice. The home range size could change over time according to individual condition (e.g., reproduction status or amount of body reserves), depends on both the landscape global structure and constraints. The landscape global structure has been shown to influence home range size through changes of spatial heterogeneity [9,10], biomass concentration [11], proximity to cover [12,13], availability of safe places and of dietary resources [14,15], wood dispersion [16], number of habitat patches [17], and edge density [18]
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