The spatial distribution of African savannah herbivores: species associations and habitat occupancy in a landscape context.

ABSTRACT: Herbivores play an important role in determining the structure and function of tropical savannahs. Here, we (i) outline a framework for how interactions among large mammalian herbivores, carnivores and environmental variation influence herbivore habitat occupancy in tropical savannahs. We then (ii) use a Bayesian hierarchical model to analyse camera trap data to quantify spatial patterns of habitat occupancy for lions and eight common ungulates of varying body size across an approximately 1100 km(2) landscape in the Serengeti ecosystem. Our results reveal strong positive associations among herbivores at the scale of the entire landscape. Lions were positively associated with migratory ungulates but negatively associated with residents. Herbivore habitat occupancy differed with body size an

SUBMITTER: Anderson TM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4978872 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature