Unraveling the ecological interactions: Exploring prey selection and human-wildlife conflicts in the diet of pumas (<i>Puma concolor</i>) in the highlands of the Tarapacá Region, Chile

Large carnivores play critical roles in terrestrial ecosystems but have suffered dramatic range contractions over the past two centuries. Developing an accurate understanding of large carnivore diets is an important first step towards an improved understanding of their ecological roles and addressing the conservation challenges faced by these species.The puma is one of seven large felid species in the world and the only one native to the non‐tropical regions of the New World. We conducted a meta‐analysis of puma diets across the species’ range in the Americas and assessed the impact of varying environmental conditions, niche roles, and human activity on puma diets. Pumas displayed remarkable dietary flexibility, consuming at least 232 different prey species, including one Critically Endangered and five Endangered species.Our meta‐analysis found clear patterns in puma diets with changing habitat and environmental conditions. Pumas consumed more larger‐bodied prey species with increasing distance from the equator, but consumption of medium‐sized species showed the opposite trend.Puma diets varied with their realized niche; however, contrary to our expectations, puma consumption of large species did not change with their trophic position, and pumas consumed more small prey and birds as apex predators. Consumption of domestic species was negatively correlated with consumption of medium‐sized wild species, a finding which underscores the importance of maintaining intact native prey assemblages.The tremendous dietary flexibility displayed by pumas represents both an opportunity and a challenge for understanding the puma’s role in ecosystems and for the species’ management and conservation. Future studies should explore the linkages between availability and selection of primary and other wild prey, and consequent impacts on predation of domestic species, in order to guide conservation actions and reduce conflict between pumas and people.

A native top predator relies on exotic prey inside a protected area: The puma and the introduced ungulates in Central Argentina

IntroductionConservation research plays an integral role in the effort to conserve biodiversity globally. However, research gaps can limit conservation research’s potential contribution to addressing global biodiversity problems such as habitat fragmentation. While a synthesis of the research literature does not attain effective conservation action by itself, it can inform future research and corridor conservation planning and practices.MethodsWe used a systematic search of peer-reviewed research articles in Scopus, Web of Science, and grey literature in the Connectivity Conservation Specialist Group library published before December 2020. Our review assessed research on the identification and use of corridors, a primary instrument used to address the threats of habitat fragmentation, for large carnivores to identify patterns, priorities, and gaps in the literature. We focused on large carnivores because they are frequently used for connectivity planning owing to their higher sensitivity to habitat fragmentation and their importance as conservation flagship species.Results and discussionWe found that peer-reviewed studies primarily focused on single-species corridors with a strong preference toward apex predators, whereas grey literature focused on multi-species corridors. More than 80% of studies included one of the following five species, the mountain lion (n=46 studies), American black bear (n=31 studies), jaguar (n=25 studies), tiger (n=25 studies), and brown bear (n=18 studies). Although research on the identification of corridors was relatively more common in the past, we found an increasing trend in the publication of studies assessing the use of corridors by large carnivores in recent years. The published research is predominantly from North America (47%) and Asia (30%), with comparatively fewer studies from Africa (4%), despite having several large carnivore species. While climate change and human-wildlife conflict are considered major concerns for large carnivore conservation, these were seldomly considered in corridor research. Corridor research collaborations exist between academia, government, and non-government institutions, but the involvement of the private sector is lacking.ConclusionsOur review shows that there is scope for future corridor research to (i) focus on areas where geographical gaps exist, (ii) target multi-species corridors, (iii) include climate change and human-wildlife conflict scenarios, and iv) increase collaboration with the private sector to better inform connectivity solutions.

Diet of puma (Puma concolor) in sheep ranches of central Patagonia (Argentina)

Wildlife strongly alter behaviour in response to human disturbance; however, fundamental questions remain regarding the influence of human infrastructure and activity on animal movement. The Covid‐19 pandemic created a natural experiment providing an opportunity to evaluate wildlife movement during a period of greatly reduced human activity. Speculation in scientific reviews and the media suggested that wildlife might be increasing movement and colonizing urban landscapes during pandemic slowdowns. However, theory predicts that animals should move and use space as efficiently as possible, suggesting that movement might actually be reduced relative to decreased human activity. We quantified space use, movement, and resource‐selection of 12 GPS‐collared mountain lions (eight females, four males) occupying parklands in greater Los Angeles during the Spring 2020 California stay‐at‐home order when human activity was far below normal. We also tested the hypothesis that reduced traffic on Los Angeles area roadways increased permeability of these barriers to animal movement. Contrary to expectations that wildlife roamed more widely during pandemic shutdowns, resident mountain lions used smaller areas and moved shorter distances relative to their historical behaviour in greater Los Angeles. They also relaxed avoidance of anthropogenic landscape features such as trails and development, which likely facilitated increased travelling efficiency. However, there was no detectable change in road‐crossing, despite reduced traffic volume. Our results support the theoretical prediction that animals maximize movement efficiency and suggest that carnivores incur energetic costs while avoiding humans. While mountain lions may restrict movement at the landscape level relative to barriers, they appear to increase distances moved at finer scales when avoiding human activity – highlighting the scale‐dependent nature of animal responses to human disturbance. Avoiding humans can reduce direct mortality of large carnivores and is often suggested to be an important mechanism promoting coexistence in shared landscapes. However, energetic costs incurred by increased movement and space‐use while avoiding human activity may have important consequences for population viability, predator–prey interactions, community structure, and human–wildlife conflict. Management providing sufficient wild prey and education regarding best practices for protection of domestic animals are important for conserving large carnivores in human‐dominated landscapes.

Neotropical puma (Puma concolor) diet is scarcely known, in particular that of mountain dwelling individuals from Northern South America. This is the first study on pumas from the paramo and the first puma diet analysis for Colombia. The puma diet was studied from 2007 to 2009 in the Puracé National Park in the South Colombian Andes. Paramos are unique neotropical high altitude ecosystems which store and regulate water, and are currently threatened by agricultural expansion and climate change. Seven latrines were monitored for three years and scat collected, washed and dried. Items in scat such as hair, bones, claws and others were separated. Hairs were inspected by microscopy and compared to voucher hair museum specimens. Bone fragments, claws and teeth were also compared to museum collections and identified wherever possible. Additionally, six cameras were set along game trails to document puma and potential prey presence in the area. Food items from five species were identified in 60 puma scats; Northern Pudu (Pudu mephistophiles) was the most important prey in their diet. A total of 354 camera trap-nights photographed a male and female puma, Northern pudu and Spectacled bear (Tremarctos ornatus). The main conclusion suggests a strong dependence of puma on the threatened and mysterious Northern Pudu in paramo habitats. This behavior might reflect restricted prey availability in the high Andes mountains of Colombia, and highlights the plasticity in the puma diet. Conservation actions in the paramo should thus, focus on focal wild species, and in particularly those that show a relationship, such as the one evidenced here with the dependence of puma on Northern Pudu. These findings contribute to increase the little known ecology of Andean puma populations and the species as a whole in Colombia. Baseline data on puma prey populations in different ecosystems throughout their range, is critical to understand the regional requirements for survival, and design conservation actions, to follow and evaluate the need for particular protected areas along their geographical gradients.

ABSTRACTChronic wasting disease (CWD) is a transmissible prion disease first observed in the 1960s in North America. This invariably fatal disease affects multiple cervid species in the wild and in captivity. In addition to the several known transmission pathways involving cervid host species, prions have been detected in the feces of crows and coyotes after consumption of experimentally spiked tissues. This raises questions about the role of cervid consumers in the perpetuation of CWD. Mountain lions have been shown to preferentially select CWD-infected prey and are also apparently resistant to infection. In this study, two captive mountain lions were fed ground mule deer muscle tissue spiked with brain-derived CWD prions, and lion feces were collected for 1 week afterward. The input brain and resulting fecal materials were analyzed using the highly sensitive real-time quaking-induced conversion (RT-QuIC) assay to quantify prion seeding activity. We recovered only 2.8 to 3.9% of input CWD prions after passage through the mountain lions’ gastrointestinal tracts. Interestingly, CWD prions were shed only in the first defecation following consumption. Our data support the possibility that mountain lions feeding upon infected carcasses could excrete CWD prions in their feces over a short period of time but also suggest that most of the ingested prions are eliminated or sequestered by this large predator.IMPORTANCE CWD prions appear to spread naturally among susceptible cervid species in captivity and in the wild. A better understanding of all the ways these prions move, persist, and subsequently infect target species through the environment is critical to developing comprehensive disease control strategies. In our study, we show limited, transient pass-through of CWD prions in an apex predator, the mountain lion, using the highly sensitive RT-QuIC assay on feces collected after lions were fed prion-spiked muscle tissue. Prions were detected in feces only in the first defecation after exposure. Moreover, the amount of CWD prions recovered in feces was reduced by >96% after passing through the lion digestive system. This indicates that mountain lions may have some potential to distribute CWD prions within their home ranges but that they also effectively eliminate most of the CWD prions they consume.

We used fecal analyses to document the diet of ocelots (Leopardus pardalis) and puma (Puma concolor) at 2 sites in central Panama. We detected puma on Barro Colorado Island (BCI) nearly every month during the study but never found evidence of jaguars (Panthera onca) at either site. Both ocelots and puma fed predominantly on mammalian prey, but consumed a diversity of species. Collared peccaries (Pecari tajacu) and Central American red brocket (Mazama temama) were the most important food items for puma, whereas Central American agoutis (Dasyprocta punctata) and sloths (Choloepus hoffmanni and Bradypus variegatus) were the most important for ocelots. Considerable overlap in diet was found between populations and species, but the diet of puma on BCI was significantly different from the 2 ocelot populations in containing more large prey, suggesting that dietary differences between these predator species are chiefly related to their relative body size. Comparing across larger scales, both populations of ocelots in our study ate larger prey than elsewhere in their range, suggesting that their fundamental niche includes more medium-sized prey than their realized niche in other sites. Puma on BCI ate proportionally more peccaries and deer than in most other populations. These unusual diets in the wake of a recent decline or local extinction of jaguars are consistent with a prey shift in response to competitive release.

Mountain lions (Puma concolor) were captured and radio-collared in the Sierra National Forest between 1983 and 1992 to study the species' seasonal spatial patterns in a location where migratory mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) are its primary prey. Some mountain lions displayed seasonal migratory shifts in elevation that mirrored those of their migratory prey; others resided at lower elevations year-round. Home range size for all mountain lions was larger in summer ( = 231 km2) than in winter ( = 110 km2), whether or not an individual exhibited seasonal migratory shifts in elevation. Due to seasonal shifts in home range size and, for part of the mountain lion population, in elevation, minimum density of mountain lions in the study area also differed seasonally (summer, 0.87 per 100 km2; winter, 1.42 per 100 km2). Overall, these findings demonstrate differing space use strategies (migratory vs. resident) within a large carnivore population that have important management implications for large carnivores because these strategies provide context for population monitoring and conflict mitigation efforts.

Human-wildlife conflicts (HWC) are complex conservation challenges that impair both wildlife populations and human livelihood. Research on HWC, however, has traditionally approached ecological and human components separately, hampering a broader understanding of connections between ecological drivers and human dimensions of conflicts. We developed a model that integrates ecological and human components of HWC to investigate how the amount of remaining native forest (forest cover, a key ecological variable known to influence species occurrence and abundance) affects human experiences with wildlife (contact with species and attacks on livestock) and how such experiences influence tolerance via beliefs, emotions, and attitudes. We tested the model with piecewise structural equation modeling and data on human interactions with 3 mammals with different rarity and body size: opossum (Didelphis aurita), crab-eating fox (Cerdocyon thous), and puma (Puma concolor). Data were obtained by interviewing 114 landowners across 13 Atlantic Forest landscapes (10-50% forest cover). Forest cover was associated with high chance of attacks on livestock, and thus with low tolerance, only in the case of the puma. Effects of distinct experiences with wildlife on beliefs and emotions varied across species. Beliefs and emotions toward wildlife influenced tolerance toward all species, but negative emotions affected tolerance toward only with the puma. Conflicts with large carnivores, such as pumas, can then be understood as disservices provided by forests, indicating the relevance of framing HWC more broadly to consider trade-offs with ecosystems services. For some species, positive experiences with wildlife may counteract the negative effects of attacks on livestock in shaping tolerance. Models such as ours-that link ecological and human dimensions-can help identify more effective leverage points to improve HWC mitigation.

ABSTRACTLarge carnivores can represent the ultimate challenge for conservation in developed landscapes because of their large area requirements and potential for conflict with humans. Some large carnivores such as mountain lions (Puma concolor) can use a wide range of biomes and vegetation types, and in southern California, USA, they persist in metropolitan Los Angeles, a megacity of 18 million people. Understanding how large carnivores use highly altered landscapes is important for their conservation and management. We estimated home range size, landscape use, and landscape selection for mountain lions in the Santa Monica Mountains and surrounding areas for 29 subadult and adult animals from 2002 to 2016, using 128,133 locations from global positioning system (GPS)‐collars. Home range size was similar to that reported by other researchers; home ranges averaged 372 km2 for adult males and 134 km2 for adult females, except for 2 adult males in isolated habitat fragments that maintained 2 of the smallest adult male home ranges ever recorded (24 km2 and 54 km2). Mountain lions very rarely entered developed areas, consistently avoided altered open areas such as golf courses, cemeteries, or other landscaped spaces, and showed a positive relationship between home range size and amount of development, all indicating that developed areas have reduced value for mountain lions. Mountain lions from all sex and age classes selected areas closer to development than expected by chance, which could be related to the presence of mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) or other prey in or adjacent to urbanization. For 2 adult males that occupied home ranges within the most urban portions of our study area, their response to urban development differed strongly across diurnal periods, ranging from avoidance during the day to selection at night. Shrub vegetation types, especially chaparral, were important in terms of habitat use and resource selection, highlighting their importance for conservation of the species in southern California. North America's largest felid can thrive in shrublands and persist even in one of the world's largest cities, although they only very rarely venture into developed areas within that city. © 2021 The Wildlife Society.

We studied movements of mountain lions ( Puma concolor ) in the southern Sierra Nevada of California from 1992–1997. We observed two distinct patterns, which likely represent strategies of mountain lions for coping with variability in abundance of their primary prey, mule deer ( Odocoileus hemionus ). Some mountain lions migrated together, often slowly, following movements of mule deer from winter range toward the summer range of their prey. Those mountain lions remained together on the eastern scarp of the Sierra Nevada and overlapped in distribution throughout the year. Other mountain lions exhibited rapid movements to disjunct summer ranges, on the western side of the Sierra Nevada, shared with mountain lions that did not occur on their winter range. Mountain lions that moved more slowly and overlapped in distribution had large annual home ranges (95% adaptive kernel; X = 817 km2), whereas mountain lions with distinct summer ( X = 425 km2) and winter ( X = 476 km2) distributions had smaller home ranges. Such disparate patterns of movement may lead to difficulties in sampling population size for mountains lions. Moreover, maintaining corridors that would allow for both patterns of movement may be critical for the conservation of these large felids. Finally, extensive overlap in the distribution of mountain lions, especially the association of one group of individuals on winter range and another on summer range for mountain lions with disjunct distributions, indicates a more flexible social system than previously described.

Successfully perceiving risk and reward is fundamental to the fitness of an animal, and can be achieved through a variety of perception tactics. For example, mesopredators may “directly” perceive risk by visually observing apex predators, or may “indirectly” perceive risk by observing habitats used by predators. Direct assessments should more accurately characterize the arrangement of risk and reward; however, indirect assessments are used more frequently in studies concerning the response of GPS‐marked animals to spatiotemporally variable sources of risk and reward. We investigated the response of a mesopredator to the presence of risk and reward created by an apex predator, where risk and reward likely vary in relative perceptibility (i.e., degree of being perceptible). First, we tested whether coyotes (Canis latrans) use direct or indirect assessments to navigate the presence of mountain lions (Puma concolor; risk) and kills made by mountain lions (reward) in an area where coyotes were a common prey item for mountain lions. Second, we assessed the behavioral response of coyotes to direct encounters with mountain lions. Third, we evaluated spatiotemporal use of carrion by coyotes at kills made by mountain lions. Indirect assessments generally outperformed direct assessments when integrating analyses into a unified framework; nevertheless, our ability to detect direct perception in navigating to mountain lion kills was likely restricted by scale and sampling limitations (e.g., collar fix rates, unsampled kill sites). Rather than responding to the risk of direct encounters with mountain lions, coyotes facilitated encounters by increasing their movement rate, and engaged in risky behavior by scavenging at mountain lion kills. Coyotes appear to mitigate risk by using indirect perception to avoid mountain lions. Our predator–predator interactions and insights are nuanced and counter to the conventional predator–prey systems that have generated much of the predation risk literature.

Following historical efforts to eradicate them, large carnivores including gray wolves (Canis lupus), mountain lions (Puma concolor), black bears (Ursus americanus), and grizzly bears (U. arctos), have demonstrated an ability to recover across rangeland habitats in western North America during the last 50 years. While former distributions of these species were greatly reduced by the early-1960s, all are exhibiting range expansion and population increase across much (e.g., mountain lion and black bear) or portions (e.g., wolf and grizzly bear) of their historical range. This recovery of large carnivores in western landscapes has led to increased conflict with humans and a greater need for science-based management strategies by agencies with statutory responsibility for wildlife conservation. As conflict potential with large carnivores has increased, so have proactive and reactive conflict management programs for those impacted by large carnivores. Imperative to any successful large carnivore conflict mitigation is a focused outreach and education program for those who live, work, and recreate in habitats where wolves, mountain lions, and bears occur. Managers are continually evaluating the challenges and realities of intact large carnivore guilds within rangeland settings. Research and monitoring furthers our understanding and efficacy of management strategies for large carnivores now and into the future, striving to build on knowledge regarding the intricacies of population dynamics among predators and prey, including domestic species and humans.

Jaguar and puma faeces (N=30) were collected in an area of 75 km2 in the tropical forest of Tamasopo in San Luis Potosi. A dot-blot assay was developed with DNA from scats in order to differentiate between jaguar and puma. This assay employed a probe recognising cytochrome b of puma. A total of 14 prey species were found, of which 7 were used by both felids. Jaguar and puma diets in this study showed an overlap of 93.38% where collared peccary was the main prey consumed by both felids (jaguar 39.64% and puma 45.76%). White-tailed deer was also present in the diets of both felids, with a similar biomass consumed (jaguar 7.64% and puma 5.88%). Brocket deer and domestic goat appeared only in the puma's diet. With the exception of some remains from a lizard in the jaguar's diet, the rest of the prey species were comprised of medium-sized prey (1–15 kg), with the common opossum and raccoon found for both felids. A method is presented to estimate the number of individuals consumed based on energy requirements. The overlap suggests an important competition between these species.