Human disturbance compresses the spatiotemporal niche

Area of Science:

• Ecology
• Conservation Biology
• Wildlife Management

Background:

• Human activities significantly alter natural environments, potentially disrupting species interactions.
• Understanding how landscape modification affects species co-occurrence is crucial for predicting community dynamics.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the impact of anthropogenic landscape modification on wildlife co-occurrence patterns.
• To determine if human disturbance increases or decreases the likelihood of species interacting.

Main Methods:

• Utilized 4 years of data from over 2,000 camera traps across a human disturbance gradient in Wisconsin, USA.
• Analyzed 74 species pairs, measuring co-occurrence probability using time between successive detections.
• Classified species pairs by antagonism level (low, medium, high) to define co-occurrence networks.

Main Results:

• Species pairs exhibited shorter intervals between detections in high-disturbance landscapes (4.1 days) compared to low-disturbance landscapes (6.1 days).
• Disturbed landscapes featured co-occurrence networks with higher connectance and a greater proportion of low-antagonism pairs.
• Increased species abundance, potentially from resource subsidies, was a more significant driver than behavioral changes.

Conclusions:

• Anthropogenic landscape modification leads to spatiotemporal compression of species co-occurrences.
• This compression likely intensifies ecological interactions such as competition and predation.
• Elevated co-occurrence may increase stress in wildlife populations, with potential cascading ecosystem effects.