By Stacie Denetsosie
Rangeland-based livestock movement could provide key insights into the movement ecology of many species of wildlife.
According to Utah State University doctoral student Maria Stahl, the field has exploded over the last 20 years in terms of the number of studies and the number of organisms and taxa that people are studying.
For many decades, the equipment required for these studies was deemed too expensive and too bulky to safely place on small animals. However, recent advancements have made GPS devices far more accessible.
Stahl notes that tracking technologies are becoming less expensive and becoming so small you can put them on birds. Satellite-based tracking now allows researchers to monitor animal locations in near real time.
Despite these advancements, knowledge gaps remain because most studies focus on wildlife populations where experimental control is nearly impossible. Stahl points out that it’s very difficult to test whether these animals do confer a benefit from being in the areas that they’re selecting for, or if they are actually selecting for the places that improve their fitness the most.
To fill these gaps, Stahl and her colleagues propose using rangeland-based livestock operations as a model system to answer some outstanding questions in the field.
Finding a suitable location for such a study can be difficult, but the Dugout Ranch in Southern Utah offered a natural fit. Home to the Canyonlands Research Center and owned by The Nature Conservancy, the ranch provided the ideal setting for Stahl to track the movements of Criollo cattle, a heritage breed originally from Mexico.
Source : usu.edu