Integrating space-use, movement and demographic data to predict the consequences of environmental change on wildlife

气候变化和土地使用变化是生物多样性面临的两大威胁。虽然土地使用的变化，即自然土地覆盖物向人类活动主导的土地覆盖物的转变，是当代生物多样性丧失的主要驱动力，但气候变化预计将在未来几年造成生物多样性的日益减少。量化这些环境变化对野生动物的影响，对于保护生物多样性和提高我们对物种在人类日益主导的世界中如何生存的理解至关重要。 迄今为止，大多数关于环境变化如何影响野生动物的研究要么集中在人口统计学上，如人口规模，要么集中在行为上，很少有整合。以种群为重点的研究对保护有直接的意义，但通常不能转化为旨在减少影响的直接管理行动，只能建议完全停止环境变化。相反，行为研究提供了关于个人如何应对变化的详细信息，但受到行为反应的存在并不总是表明变化的负面影响的事实的限制。提高我们对环境变化、人口和行为之间的联系的理解，对于制定有效和有针对性的保护战略至关重要。我的计划的目标是量化行为和人口统计学之间的相互作用，以预测环境变化对物种的影响。 为了实现上述目标，我的团队将使用关于人口统计学，空间使用和北极熊，黑尾鹿和黑熊在环境变化压力下的运动的长期数据集。我们将结合联合收割机数据的动物空间使用和移动从全球定位系统无线电项圈，个人措施的繁殖，生存和条件，人口动态从人口调查，以解决三个广泛的问题，有助于我们更大的目标：1）动物的空间行为可以用来预测人口下降与气候变化？2)对栖息地改变的行为反应是否降低了个体的适应性，或缓冲了它们的影响？3)人口密度如何影响动物对环境变化的反应？ 我的研究计划将通过量化个人和种群之间的联系，对环境变化如何影响物种产生更全面的看法。这项研究将为野生动物管理和保护工作者提供知识，以实施更有效的缓解和适应战略，限制环境变化对野生动物的影响。除了这些对野生动物管理和保护的直接好处外，我还将培训16名HQP（6名研究生和10名本科暑期学生），了解野生动物生态学和评估行为与人口统计学之间相互作用所需的尖端统计技术。

Climate and land-use change are the two greatest threats to biodiversity. Although land-use change, the conversion of natural land-cover to those dominated by human activities, is the primary driver of contemporary biodiversity loss, climate change is expected to cause increasing declines in the coming years. Quantifying the impacts of these environmental changes on wildlife is critical for conserving biodiversity and improving our understanding of how species will exist in an increasingly human-dominated world. To-date, most studies of how environmental change impacts wildlife have either focused on demographic rates, such as population size, or behaviour, with little integration. Studies focused on populations are of direct interest for conservation, but typically cannot be translated into direct management actions aimed at reducing impacts, other than suggesting the cessation of environmental change entirely. Contrastingly, studies of behaviour provide detailed information on how individuals respond to change, but are limited by the fact that the presence of behavioural responses does not always indicate negative effects of change. Improving our understanding of how environmental change, demography and behaviour are linked is critical for developing effective and targeted conservation strategies. The goal of my program is to quantify the interactions between behaviour and demography to predict the consequences of environmental change on species. To meet the above goal, my group will use long term datasets on demography, space-use and movement from populations of polar bears, mule deer and black bears under stress from environmental change. We will combine data on animal space-use and movement from global positioning system radio collars, individual measures of reproduction, survival and condition, and population dynamics from population surveys to address three broad questions that contribute to our larger goal: 1) can the spatial behaviour of animals be used to predict population declines related to climate change? 2) Do behavioural responses to habitat alteration reduce the fitness of individuals, or buffer them from impacts? 3) How does population density influence how animals respond to environmental change? My research program will produce a more holistic view of how environmental change impacts species by quantifying the links between individuals and populations. This research will provide those working in wildlife management and conservation the knowledge to implement more effective mitigation and adaptation strategies to limit the impacts of environmental change on wildlife. Aside from these direct benefits to wildlife management and conservation, I will train 16 HQP (6 graduate students and 10 undergraduate summer students) in wildlife ecology and cutting edge statistical techniques needed to assess the interactions between behaviour and demography.