Are camera surveys useful for assessing recruitment in white-tailed deer?
- North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, NC (United States). Dept. of Forestry and Environmental Resources
- US Dept. of Agriculture (USDA). Forest Service, New Ellenton, SC (United States)
- Joseph W. Jones Ecological Research Center, Newton, GA (United States)
- US Dept. of Agriculture (USDA). Forest Service, Columbia, SC (United States)
- South Carolina Dept. of Natural Resources, Columbia, SC (United States)
- Univ. of Georgia, Athens, GA (United States). Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources
Camera surveys commonly are used by managers and hunters to estimate white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus density and demographic rates. Though studies have documented biases and inaccuracies in the camera survey methodology, camera traps remain popular due to ease of use, cost-effectiveness, and ability to survey large areas. Because recruitment is a key parameter in ungulate population dynamics, there is a growing need to test the effectiveness of camera surveys for assessing fawn recruitment. At Savannah River Site, South Carolina, we used six years of camera-based recruitment estimates (i.e. fawn:doe ratio) to predict concurrently collected annual radiotag-based survival estimates. The coefficient of determination (R) was 0.445, indicating some support for the viability of cameras to reflect recruitment. Here, we added two years of data from Fort Bragg Military Installation, North Carolina, which improved R to 0.621 without accounting for site-specific variability. Also, we evaluated the correlation between year-to-year changes in recruitment and survival using the Savannah River Site data; R was 0.758, suggesting that camera-based recruitment could be useful as an indicator of the trend in survival. Because so few researchers concurrently estimate survival and camera-based recruitment, examining this relationship at larger spatial scales while controlling for numerous confounding variables remains difficult. We believe that future research should test the validity of our results from other areas with varying deer and camera densities, as site (e.g. presence of feral pigs Sus scrofa) and demographic (e.g. fawn age at time of camera survey) parameters may have a large influence on detectability. Until such biases are fully quantified, we urge researchers and managers to use caution when advocating the use of camera-based recruitment estimates.
- Research Organization:
- North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AI09-00SR22188
- OSTI ID:
- 1393448
- Journal Information:
- Wildlife Biology, Vol. 1, Issue 2017; ISSN 0909-6396
- Publisher:
- BioOneCopyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Web of Science
Snap happy: camera traps are an effective sampling tool when compared with alternative methods
|
journal | March 2019 |
Estimating recruitment from capture–recapture data by modelling spatio‐temporal variation in birth and age‐specific survival rates
|
journal | July 2018 |
Similar Records
Can coyotes affect deer populations in Southeastern North America?
White-tailed deer population dynamics and adult female survival in the presence of a novel predator: Deer Population Dynamics