Effects of large-scale disturbance on animal space use: Functional responses by greater sage-grouse after megafire.

ABSTRACT: Global change has altered the nature of disturbance regimes, and megafire events are increasingly common. Megafires result in immediate changes to habitat available to terrestrial wildlife over broad landscapes, yet we know surprisingly little about how such changes shape space use of sensitive species in habitat that remains. Functional responses provide a framework for understanding and predicting changes in space use following habitat alteration, but no previous studies have assessed functional responses as a consequence of megafire. We studied space use and tested for functional responses in habitat use by breeding greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) before and after landscape-level changes induced by a >40,000 ha, high-intensity megafire that burned sagebrush steppe

SUBMITTER: Stevens BS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10082181 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature