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Spatiotemporal patterns of Amur leopards in northeast China: Influence of tigers, prey, and humans

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Abstract

The Amur leopard Panthera pardus orientalis is one of the most endangered cat subspecies in the world. The rare leopard is sympatric with Amur tiger Panthera tigris altaica and their prey in human dominated landscape. To conserve the felid species, it is important to understand the activity patterns of Amur leopards, including its interactions with Amur tigers, prey, and human activities. We used a data set from 163 camera traps to quantify the spatial-temporal overlap between Amur leopards, Amur tigers, prey species, and human disturbances (e.g., humans presence on foot, vehicles, domestic dogs, and cattle grazing) from January to December 2013 in the Hunchun Nature Reserve, NE China. Our results indicated that leopards were more active in daytime and twilight; the seasonal spatial-temporal overlaps between leopards and tigers were lower than that between leopards and their prey species. Human activities and cattle grazing could influence the spatial distribution and activity patterns of the leopards, and therefore, the conservation actions should focus on reduction of human disturbances to minimize the impacts to Amur leopard activity patterns.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Monitoring and Research Center for Amur tiger and Amur leopard, State Forestry Administration, State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface and Resource Ecology, Ministry of Education Key for Biodiversity Science and Engineering, College of Life sciences, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, China

    Haitao Yang, Xiaodan Zhao, Boyu Han, Tianming Wang, Pu Mou, Jianping Ge & Limin Feng

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  1. Haitao Yang
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  2. Xiaodan Zhao
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  3. Boyu Han
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Correspondence to Limin Feng.

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Yang, H., Zhao, X., Han, B. et al. Spatiotemporal patterns of Amur leopards in northeast China: Influence of tigers, prey, and humans. Mamm Biol 92, 120–128 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mambio.2018.03.009

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