Modelling Eurasian beaver foraging habitat and dam suitability, for predicting the location and number of dams throughout catchments in Great Britain.

ABSTRACT: Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber) populations are expanding across Europe. Depending on location, beaver dams bring multiple benefits and/or require management. Using nationally available data, we developed: a Beaver Forage Index (BFI), identifying beaver foraging habitat, and a Beaver Dam Capacity (BDC) model, classifying suitability of river reaches for dam construction, to estimate location and number of dams at catchment scales. Models were executed across three catchments, in Great Britain (GB), containing beaver. An area of 6747 km² was analysed for BFI and 16,739 km of stream for BDC. Field surveys identified 258 km of channel containing beaver activity and 89 dams, providing data to test predictions. Models were evaluated using a categorical binomial Bayesian framewo

SUBMITTER: Graham HA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7319418 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature