Can sacrificial feeding areas protect aquatic plants from herbivore grazing?: using behavioural ecology to inform wildlife management

Wood, Kevin A.; Stillman, Richard A.; Daunt, Francis ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4638-3388; O'Hare, Matthew T.. 2014 Can sacrificial feeding areas protect aquatic plants from herbivore grazing?: using behavioural ecology to inform wildlife management. PLoS ONE, 9 (7), e104034. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0104034

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Text Copyright: © 2014 Wood et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. N507991JA.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (359kB) | Preview

Abstract/Summary

Effective wildlife management is needed for conservation, economic and human well-being objectives. However, traditional population control methods are frequently ineffective, unpopular with stakeholders, may affect non-target species, and can be both expensive and impractical to implement. New methods which address these issues and offer effective wildlife management are required. We used an individual-based model to predict the efficacy of a sacrificial feeding area in preventing grazing damage by mute swans (Cygnus olor) to adjacent river vegetation of high conservation and economic value. The accuracy of model predictions was assessed by a comparison with observed field data, whilst prediction robustness was evaluated using a sensitivity analysis. We used repeated simulations to evaluate how the efficacy of the sacrificial feeding area was regulated by (i) food quantity, (ii) food quality, and (iii) the functional response of the forager. Our model gave accurate predictions of aquatic plant biomass, carrying capacity, swan mortality, swan foraging effort, and river use. Our model predicted that increased sacrificial feeding area food quantity and quality would prevent the depletion of aquatic plant biomass by swans. When the functional response for vegetation in the sacrificial feeding area was increased, the food quantity and quality in the sacrificial feeding area required to protect adjacent aquatic plants were reduced. Our study demonstrates how the insights of behavioural ecology can be used to inform wildlife management. The principles that underpin our model predictions are likely to be valid across a range of different resource-consumer interactions, emphasising the generality of our approach to the evaluation of strategies for resolving wildlife management problems.

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0104034
UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas:	Watt
ISSN:	1932-6203
Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.:	Open Access paper - Official URL link provides full text
NORA Subject Terms:	Ecology and Environment Zoology Botany
Date made live:	01 Aug 2014 12:58 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/507991

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