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Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
environmental science
How key habitat features influence large terrestrial carnivore movements: Waterholes and African lions in a semi-arid savanna of north-western Zimbabwe
Landscape Ecology, Volume 25, No. 3, Year 2010
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Description
Within a landscape where prey has an aggregated distribution, predators can take advantage of the spatial autocorrelation of prey density and intensify their search effort in areas of high prey density by using area-restricted search behaviour. In African arid and semi-arid savannas, large herbivores tend to aggregate around scarce water sources. We tested the hypothesis that water sources are a key determinant of habitat selection and movement patterns of large free-ranging predators in such savannas, using the example of the African lion. We used data from 19 GPS radio-collared lions in Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe. Maps of lions' trajectories showed that waterholes are key loci on the lions' route-maps. Compositional analyses revealed that lions significantly selected for areas located within 2 km of a waterhole. In addition, analysis of lions' night paths showed that when lions are close to a waterhole (<2 km), they move at lower speed, cover shorter distances per night (both path length and net displacement) and follow a more tortuous path (higher turning angle, lower straightness index and higher fractal dimension) than when they are further from a waterhole. Hence, our results strongly suggest that lions adopt area-restricted searching in the vicinity of waterholes, and reduce their search effort to minimize the time spent far from a waterhole. They provide an illustration of how key habitat features that determine the dispersion of prey (e.g. waterholes in this study) have an influence on the spatial ecology and movement patterns of terrestrial predators. © 2009 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
Authors & Co-Authors
Valeix, Marion
United Kingdom, Oxford
University of Oxford
France, Villeurbanne
Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1
Loveridge, Andrew J.
United Kingdom, Oxford
University of Oxford
Davidson, Zeke
United Kingdom, Oxford
University of Oxford
Madzikanda, Hillary
Zimbabwe, Causeway
Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority
Fritz, Hervé
France, Villeurbanne
Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1
Macdonald, David W.
United Kingdom, Oxford
University of Oxford
Statistics
Citations: 182
Authors: 6
Affiliations: 3
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1007/s10980-009-9425-x
ISSN:
09212973
e-ISSN:
15729761
Research Areas
Environmental
Study Locations
Zimbabwe