Trophic and spatial relationships of the pine marten (Martes martes) and American mink (Neovison vison) on mountain rivers of the Southern Urals

Abstract

The American mink (Neovison vison) and pine marten (Martes martes) are the most common mustelid species in mountain forests of the Southern Urals. The bulk of the diet (85.3%) in the American mink consists of small mammals (35.8%), insects (22.7%), gastropods (14.1%), and fish (12.7%). In the pine marten, the main components comprising 79.6% of the diet are vegetable foods (29.8%), small mammals (27.0%), and insects (22.8%). The low diversity of their food spectra is accounted for by landscape and eco� logical features of the study region. The abundance of rodents is low, their distribution has a mosaic pattern, and other kinds of food are more abundant near rivers and streams, which explains the preference of both mustelid species for riparian biotopes. The breadth of trophic niches in the pine marten and American mink are 1.67 and 1.62, respectively, and the coefficient of their overlap is 0.75.