Habitat structure and the presence of large carnivores shape the site use of an understudied small carnivore: caracal ecology in a miombo woodland

Davis, R.S. ORCID: 0000-0002-9953-1340, Gentle, L.K. ORCID: 0000-0003-4864-5775, Mgoola, W.O., Stone, E.L., Uzal, A. ORCID: 0000-0001-6478-1895 and Yarnell, R.W. ORCID: 0000-0001-6584-7374, 2022. Habitat structure and the presence of large carnivores shape the site use of an understudied small carnivore: caracal ecology in a miombo woodland. Mammal Research. ISSN 2199-2401

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Abstract

Basic ecological knowledge on African small carnivores and how they interact with the wider carnivore guild are lacking for many species. The caracal (Caracal caracal) has a widespread distribution across Africa, yet there is a paucity of information on this species outside of savannah and agricultural landscapes. Using camera trap data from Kasungu National Park, Malawi, we provide novel information on caracal habitat use in a miombo woodland and compare the spatiotemporal dynamics between caracal and members of the large carnivore guild (leopard, Panthera pardus and spotted hyaena, Crocuta crocuta). We found that caracal were more likely to use sites with higher grass cover and further away from permanent water sources. Caracal site use increased in areas with lower spotted hyaena abundance and caracal exhibited different temporal activity patterns to spotted hyaena. In contrast, caracal did not exhibit spatial or temporal avoidance of leopard at the scale investigated here. However, the probability of detecting caracal at sites of higher leopard abundance was significantly lower, suggesting possible behavioural mechanisms to avoid interaction. Our study provides an insight into caracal ecology in a miombo woodland and improves our understanding of community dynamics between a lesser-studied small carnivore and the large carnivore guild.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Mammal Research
Creators:	Davis, R.S., Gentle, L.K., Mgoola, W.O., Stone, E.L., Uzal, A. and Yarnell, R.W.
Publisher:	Springer
Date:	18 October 2022
ISSN:	2199-2401
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1007/s13364-022-00655-1 DOI 1619629 Other
Rights:	This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Animal, Rural and Environmental Sciences
Record created by:	Jonathan Gallacher
Date Added:	16 Nov 2022 13:47
Last Modified:	16 Nov 2022 13:47
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/47420

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