Consequences of climate-induced vegetation changes exceed those of human disturbance for wild impala in the Serengeti ecosystem.

ABSTRACT: In East Africa, climate change is predicted to reduce vegetation quality, and pervasive human disturbance has already resulted in significant declines in biodiversity. We studied the combined effects of reduced forage quality and human disturbance on faecal glucocorticoid metabolite (FGM) concentrations. We predicted that decreasing nutritional quality and increasing human disturbance would have an additive positive effect on FGM levels in wild impala (Aepyceros melampus). Employing a space-for-time approach, we used normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) as a measure of forage quality, combined with spatially explicit proxies of human disturbance across areas of different protection management strategies in the Serengeti ecosystem. We collected 639 faecal samples, spread ove

SUBMITTER: Hunninck L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7246078 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature