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Pocket gophers provide vital ecosystem services; however, species like the southeastern pocket gopher (Geomys pinetis), endemic to the southeastern United States, are declining. Long-term conservation of this species requires greater understanding of its habitat characteristics. Our objective here was to determine habitat features associated with southeastern pocket gopher occurrence at the local (100 ha) and home-range (0.09 ha) scales. We assessed occurrence and carried out vegetation surveys at 177 sites across the species’ range during the growing season (March–September) 2016–2017. At the local scale, we found a negative relationship between occurrence and groundcover height and a quadratic relationship with canopy closure. At the home-range scale, occurrence was positively related to grass groundcover and had a quadratic relationship with canopy closure. Restoration of southeastern pocket gopher habitat should focus on creating or maintaining areas with intermediate canopy (~45–55%) and an understory dominated by grasses and forbs.

Large carnivore restoration programs are often promoted as capable of providing ecosystem services. However, these programs rarely measure effects of successful restoration on other economically and ecologically important species. In South Florida, while the endangered Florida panther Puma concolor coryi population has increased in recent years due to conservation efforts, the population of its main prey, the white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus, has declined in some regions. The extent to which panther predation has affected deer populations has been difficult to assess because several other factors have changed during this period, including hydrology and hunting regulations. We collected known-fate survival data on 241 GPS-collared adult deer (156 females and 85 males) from 2015 to 2018 in the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge and the Big Cypress National Preserve in Florida, USA, to assess effects of panther predation on the deer population, while also evaluating the impacts of hunting and hydrology. Predation was the primary cause of death (110 of 134 mortalities), and 87% of predation events were attributed to panthers, a much greater rate than reported by studies conducted before the panther genetic restoration effort initiated in 1995. One deer was legally harvested, and two were likely killed by poachers. Increasing water depth decreased female survival but had little impact on male survival, and drowning was never a cause of mortality. Females had greater survival probability than males, except during fawning season. From 2015 to 2018, annual survival rates increased from 0.61 (0.52-0.70) to 0.86 (0.79-0.91) for females, and from 0.45 (95% CI: 0.33-0.58) to 0.79 (0.69-0.86) for males. Synthesis and applications. High predation rates, coupled with previous evidence of low recruitment of deer in South Florida, suggest that it will be challenging to meet society's competing demands for large predator restoration and sustainable deer harvest. Deer hunting in the area must remain tightly controlled, for now, if it is to be sustainable, and managers should seek to mitigate effects of high waters and improve deer habitat quality to increase deer population viability. Future work should closely monitor the deer population to assess if management actions can increase vital rates and abundance in the context of high predation rates. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission Published version Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

Prey species often mitigate predation risk through alteration of spatiotemporal diel activity patterns whereby prey access high-quality resources in risky areas during predator downtimes. However, dominance hierarchies exist in some prey species, and temporal partitioning is a mechanism thought to reduce aggressive intraspecific interactions. How demographic-specific responses to predation risk influence intraspecific temporal partitioning in prey are largely unknown and could be key to understanding the effects of predators on intraspecific interactions in prey. To assess the effects of predation risk on intraspecific interactions in white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), we monitored deer diel activity during the fawning season in four pairs of predator exclusion and control plots (~40 ha) from 2015 to 2018 using 16 camera traps. We examined the effect of predation risk on diel activity of males, females, and nursery groups by comparing the within-group coefficient of activity overlap (d̂) across predator exclusion and control plots. We then examined within-treatment activity overlap between groups in the predator exclosure and control plots. All groups maintained different diel activity patterns in safe and risky areas. Unconstrained by predation risk, all groups behaved more similarly, and interspecific group overlap was greater in the predator exclusion plots than control plots. Male-nursery group overlap exhibited the strongest treatment effect, increasing 24% in predator exclusion plots (d̂ = 0.91, confidence interval [CI]: 0.87–0.95) relative to control plots (d̂ = 0.67, CI: 0.57–0.76). Our results suggest predators increase heterogeneity in prey behavior and may be important drivers of behavioral processes, such as temporal partitioning, that minimize antagonistic intraspecific interactions of prey.

An animal’s pelage, feather, or skin color can serve a variety of functions, so it is important to have multiple standardized methods for measuring color. One of the most common and reliable methods for measuring animal coloration is the use of standardized digital photographs of animals. New technology in the form of a commercially available handheld digital color sensor could provide an alternative to photography-based animal color measurements. To determine whether a digital color sensor could be used to measure animal coloration, we tested the ability of a digital color sensor to measure coloration of mammalian, avian, and lepidopteran museums specimens. We compared results from the sensor to measurements taken using traditional photography methods. Our study yielded significant differences between photography-based and digital color sensor measurements of brightness (light to dark) and colors along the green to red spectrum. There was no difference between photographs and the digital color sensor measurements for colors along the blue to yellow spectrum. The average difference in recorded color (ΔE) by the 2 methods was above the threshold at which humans can perceive a difference. There were significant correlations between the sensor and photographs for all measurements indicating that the sensor is an effective animal coloration measuring tool. However, the sensor’s small aperture and narrow light spectrum range designed for human-vision limit its value for ecological research. We discuss the conditions in which a digital color sensor can be an effective tool for measuring animal coloration in both laboratory settings and in the field.

Both fire and predators have strong influences on the population dynamics and behaviour of animals, and the effects of predators may either be strengthened or weakened by fire. However, knowledge of how fire drives or mediates predator-prey interactions is fragmented and has not been synthesised. Here, we review and synthesise knowledge of how fire influences predator and prey behaviour and interactions. We develop a conceptual model based on predator-prey theory and empirical examples to address four key questions: (i) how and why do predators respond to fire; (ii) how and why does prey vulnerability change post-fire; (iii) what mechanisms do prey use to reduce predation risk post-fire; and (iv) what are the outcomes of predator-fire interactions for prey populations? We then discuss these findings in the context of wildlife conservation and ecosystem management before outlining priorities for future research. Fire-induced changes in vegetation structure, resource availability, and animal behaviour influence predator-prey encounter rates, the amount of time prey are vulnerable during an encounter, and the conditional probability of prey death given an encounter. How a predator responds to fire depends on fire characteristics (e.g. season, severity), their hunting behaviour (ambush or pursuit predator), movement behaviour, territoriality, and intra-guild dynamics. Prey species that rely on habitat structure for avoiding predation often experience increased predation rates and lower survival in recently burnt areas. By contrast, some prey species benefit from the opening up of habitat after fire because it makes it easier to detect predators and to modify their behaviour appropriately. Reduced prey body condition after fire can increase predation risk either through impaired ability to escape predators, or increased need to forage in risky areas due to being energetically stressed. To reduce risk of predation in the post-fire environment, prey may change their habitat use, increase sheltering behaviour, change their movement behaviour, or use camouflage through cryptic colouring and background matching. Field experiments and population viability modelling show instances where fire either amplifies or does not amplify the impacts of predators on prey populations, and vice versa. In some instances, intense and sustained post-fire predation may lead to local extinctions of prey populations. Human disruption of fire regimes is impacting faunal communities, with consequences for predator and prey behaviour and population dynamics. Key areas for future research include: capturing data continuously before, during and after fires; teasing out the relative importance of changes in visibility and shelter availability in different contexts; documenting changes in acoustic and olfactory cues for both predators and prey; addressing taxonomic and geographic biases in the literature; and predicting and testing how changes in fire-regime characteristics reshape predator-prey interactions. Understanding and managing the consequences for predator-prey communities will be critical for effective ecosystem management and species conservation in this era of global change.

The healthy herds hypothesis (HHH) suggests that predators decrease parasitism in their prey. Repeated tests of this hypothesis across a range of taxa and ecosystems have revealed significant variation in the effect of predators on parasites in prey. Differences in the response to predators (1) between prey taxa, (2) between seasons, and (3) before and after catastrophic disturbance are common in natural systems, but typically ignored in empirical tests of the HHH. We used a predator exclusion experiment to measure the effect of these heterogeneities on the tri-trophic interaction among predators, parasites and prey. We experimentally excluded mammalian predators from the habitats of hispid cotton rats (Sigmodon hispidus) and cotton mice (Peromyscus gossypinus) and measured the effect of exclusion on gastrointestinal parasites in these rodents. Our experiment spanned multiple seasons and before and after a prescribed burn. We found that the exclusion of the same predators had opposite effects on the parasites of small mammal prey species. Additionally, we found that the effect of mammal exclusion on parasitism differed before versus after fire disturbance. Finally, we saw that the effect of predator exclusion was highly dependent on prey capture season. Significant effects of exclusion emerged primarily in the fall and winter months. The presence of so many different effects in one relatively simple system suggests that predator effects on parasites in prey are highly context dependent.

Predator communities are changing worldwide: large carnivores are declining while mesocarnivores (medium-sized mammalian predators) are increasing in number and ecological influence. Predator choice of prey is not random and different predators select prey with different characteristics. Changes in predator communities can change predation patterns experienced by prey. Little is known about how mesocarnivore communities influence prey morphology. We used 14 years of mark-recapture data to investigate how mesocarnivore exclusion affected body mass of hispid cotton rats (Sigmodon hispidus). Finding adult male cotton rats were 9% heavier with mesocarnivore exclusion, we developed hypotheses to explain this observation. Greater adult male body mass in exclosures resulted from: (1) a non-significant trend of increased survival of large males, (2) faster juvenile male growth during the fall and a similar non-significant trend among adult males, and (3) spatial partitioning by size among males. Taxa-specific predation rates (i.e., rates of predation by snakes, raptors, or mesocarnivores) did not differ among male body mass classes. Mesocarnivores disproportionately preyed on large females while raptors targeted small females, but female body mass was not influenced by mesocarnivore exclusion. Changes in predator communities can result in multiple small effects that collectively result in large differences in prey morphology.

An animal's perception of predation risk varies across a heterogeneous landscape. Animals rely on indirect cues in the environment, including availability of protective cover, openness of sightlines and distance to refuge to evaluate potential predation risk. Interactions between the indirect cues that influence an animal's perception of predation risk are poorly understood, especially for prey at risk of avian and terrestrial predation. We conducted a giving-up density (GUD) study to examine how interactions between terrestrial predator presence, ceiling (canopy) cover, wall (shrub/grass) cover and distance to nearest tree influence fox squirrel, Sciurus niger, risk perception. The GUD indicates an animal's perceived predation risk, such that increased GUD (decreased foraging) corresponds to greater perceived risk. We found that fox squirrels perceived cues of predation risk in response to a synergistic interaction between ceiling and wall cover. In open canopy areas, fox squirrels increased GUD where there was also increased wall cover. However, fox squirrels reduced GUD in closed canopy areas where there was also increased wall cover. We attribute the differential effects of wall cover depending on ceiling cover to the effectiveness of open sightlines in decreasing predation risk from avian or terrestrial predators. Our study shows that the effect of vegetation structure on prey risk perception and antipredator behaviour depends on the relative risk posed by avian and terrestrial predators that use different hunting strategies.

Open pine ecosystems of the southern United States are a conservation priority for many agencies, organizations, and private landowners. These woodlands, characterized by moderately-stocked overstories, low cover of midstory, and grass-dominated herbaceous groundcover, provide important habitat for a suite of rare and declining wildlife species. To provide guidance for land managers engaged in habitat restoration in open pine ecosystems, ranges of desired conditions for elements of vegetation structure have been developed using literature survey and expert opinion. We compared empirical data on habitat occupancy for 17 wildlife species from second-growth longleaf pine woodlands in southwestern Georgia with recommended ranges for basal area (BA) of all pine, BA of pine ≥ 35.5 cm dbh, percent canopy cover, percent herbaceous cover, and percent shrub cover. Vegetation data were taken from 864 monitoring plots and Mahalanobis distance models were used to develop habitat suitability indices from the wildlife data. Recommendations for shrub cover and BA of pines ≥ 35.5 cm fit well with model predictions for all wildlife species. However, mean BA of all pines at sites used by wildlife were at the low end of the recommended range. Herbaceous cover at sites used by wildlife was well below the recommended range, whereas canopy cover was well above recommendations, suggesting these ranges should be expanded. These modifications could provide managers of open pine ecosystems greater flexibility, allowing them to incorporate a broader suite of objectives in their management while still providing habitat for wildlife species of concern. Moreover, our models suggest that monitoring presence of open pine indicator bird species may be an efficient method to assess restoration or management progress of open canopy pine systems.

Biofluorescence in mammal pelage is considered rare, but has been documented in multiple taxa in recent years. Herein, we provide the first observations of biofluorescence in fossorial mammals. We documented biofluorescence in live Geomys pinetis (southeastern pocket gopher) and in museum specimens of four additional geomyid species. Although unknown, the adaptive significance of biofluorescence in pocket gophers is likely similar to that documented in terrestrial and arboreal species previously, including communication or predator evasion.

Fear of the human 'super predator' has been demonstrated to so alter the feeding behavior of large carnivores as to cause trophic cascades. It has yet to be experimentally tested if fear of humans has comparably large effects on the feeding behavior of large herbivores. We conducted a predator playback experiment exposing white-tailed deer to the vocalizations of humans, extant or locally extirpated non-human predators (coyotes, cougars, dogs, wolves), or non-predator controls (birds), at supplemental food patches to measure the relative impacts on deer feeding behavior. Deer were more than twice as likely to flee upon hearing humans than other predators, and hearing humans was matched only by hearing wolves in reducing overall feeding time gaged by visits to the food patch in the following hour. Combined with previous, site-specific research linking deer fecundity to predator abundance, this study reveals that fear of humans has the potential to induce a larger effect on ungulate reproduction than has ever been reported. By demonstrating that deer most fear the human 'super predator', our results point to the fear humans induce in large ungulates having population- and community-level impacts comparable to those caused by the fear humans induce in large carnivores.

Simple Summary Bait is often used to attract wildlife to enhance viewing opportunities, increase harvest rates, or to improve population survey methods for research and management purposes. However, baiting wildlife can alter animal behavior, leading to negative outcomes such as increased disease transmission, competition, and susceptibility to predation. Our objectives were to determine the effects of short-term baiting on male white-tailed deer behavior and distributions within several properties in southwestern Georgia, USA. We used cameras at baited and unbaited locations to assess the impacts of bait on deer space use within home ranges and to determine whether bait caused shifts in the distribution of home ranges during summer and winter surveys. We found little evidence that short-term baiting affected the distributions of home ranges on the landscape; however, we found evidence that space use within home ranges was affected by bait. By concentrating deer space use within seasonal home ranges, bait may enhance disease transmission and change harvest susceptibility. Abstract Bait is often used to increase wildlife harvest susceptibility, enhance viewing opportunities, and survey wildlife populations. The effects of baiting depend on how bait influences space use and resource selection at multiple spatial scales. Although telemetry studies allow for inferences about resource selection within home ranges (third-order selection), they provide limited information about spatial variation in density, which is the result of second-order selection. Recent advances in spatial capture-recapture (SCR) techniques allow exploration of second- and third-order selection simultaneously using non-invasive methods such as camera traps. Our objectives were to describe how short-term baiting affects white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) behavior and distribution. We fit SCR models to camera data from baited and unbaited locations in southwestern Georgia to assess the effects of short-term baiting on second- and third-order selection of deer during summer and winter surveys. We found little evidence of second-order selection during late summer or early winter surveys when camera surveys using bait are typically conducted. However, we found evidence for third-order selection, indicating that resource selection within home ranges is affected. Concentrations in space use resulting from baiting may enhance disease transmission, change harvest susceptibility, and potentially bias the outcome of camera surveys using bait.

Animals living underground deal with multiple physiological challenges, such as hypoxia and hypercarbia, but may have reduced thermoregulation demands because of the more stable underground microclimate. Southeastern pocket gophers (Geomys pinetis Rafinesque) occur in the fire-adapted, open-pine forests of the southeastern Atlantic Coastal Plain where prescribed fire is commonly used to manage understory vegetation. They are almost exclusively fossorial, and their tunnels provide ecological services, including shelter, for a suite of commensal vertebrates and invertebrates. To quantify potential thermoregulation benefits of southeastern pocket gopher tunnels, we compared temperatures in active tunnels (n = 31) to aboveground temperatures during winter (December 2018–February 2019), and to aboveground temperatures during prescribed fire events (n = 16) occurring in spring (March–May 2019). During winter, tunnels provided a more stable thermal environment (average range = 6.5 ± 0.8 C; mean ± se) relative to aboveground (average range = 24.8 ± 1.8 C) temperatures. Similarly, mean tunnel temperature range (2.05 ± 0.5 C) was significantly narrower than aboveground temperature range associated with fire events (497.0 ± 101.4 C). Clearly, tunnels provide a stable thermal environment for pocket gophers and commensals that use their tunnel systems.

We observed a series of long-distance movements by an adult male Sciurus niger (Eastern Fox Squirrel). The squirrel traveled 1040 m between 25 May and 27 May, and ≥503 m on 5 separate occasions between 29 April and 25 May 2017. The individual traveled between experimental foraging sites and was photographed by remote cameras placed at each site. The time it took to travel between sites varied from 1 h and 5 min to 5 h and 7 min. The distance this squirrel regularly traveled is approximately the diameter of an average Eastern Fox Squirrel home range in the southeastern United States.

Longleaf pine (Pinus palustris) forests rely on prescribed fire to limit encroachment of hardwoods and maintain early successional understory communities. However, prescribed fire may alter habitat availability while female eastern wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo silvestris) are reproductively active. In addition, the vigor of vegetation regrowth post-fire is impacted by both midstory and overstory stand-conditions which can be a function of stand age. Therefore, the degree to which prescribed fire affects habitat availability and selection of wild turkeys may be a function of both time-since-fire and the age of the stand fire was applied to. We assessed habitat selection of female wild turkeys during their reproductive cycle in a longleaf pine forest managed with frequent prescribed fire. We captured 63 female wild turkeys during 2015 and 2016 on a longleaf pine-dominated landscape in southwestern Georgia, USA, that was managed with 1–3 year fire-return intervals applied to relatively small burn blocks (mean size of burn = 26.02 ha in 2015; 19.84 ha in 2016) on pine stands of varying age-classes. We attached Global Positioning Systems units to individuals and collected hourly locations from 1 March to 15 August. We then used distance-based analyses to estimate daily selection or avoidance of vegetation communities relative to the known reproductive phenology of individual females. Females selected hardwood stands during pre-nesting and post-nesting phases, but avoided them during the incubation phase. Females used open vegetation communities during all phases of reproduction following pre-nesting. Turkeys selected areas burned ≤2 years prior but used different seral stages of pine during different reproductive phases. Specifically, females selected for recently burned mature pine stands during incubation but then selected for recently burned young pine stands, mature pine stands burned 2 years earlier, and open vegetation communities during brooding. Our findings demonstrate that time-since-fire and stand seral age interact to affect how turkeys use pyric landscapes. In general, pine stands providing ample understory vegetation are favored while females are reproductively active. Our data suggests practitioners should try to manage a landscape containing both young and mature pine stands and use prescribed fire to create understory conditions selected by turkeys across all reproductive phases.

Carrion is an important resource, and competition for carrion by microbial, invertebrate, and vertebrate scavenging communities is great. In particular, carrion is important to facultative and obligate vertebrate scavengers globally, and these species provide an irreplaceable ecological service by efficiently removing carcasses, which potentially harbor pathogens, from the environment. Although vertebrates efficiently acquire carcasses, they compete intensively with invertebrate and microbial communities, especially during warmer months when invertebrate and microbial activity peaks. The presence of invasive invertebrates may further exacerbate competition among scavenging groups; however, little is known about how invasive invertebrates can influence invertebrate scavenger dynamics and ultimately competition with vertebrate scavengers. The red imported fire ant (Solenopsis invicta; RIFA) is an invasive species of particular interest in North America, as it is a dominant predator and decomposer throughout much their range. We hypothesized that in areas where abundant, RIFA can outcompete vertebrates for carrion resources, altering nutrient cycling and food web dynamics. We tested this hypothesis by experimentally excluding RIFA from rabbit carcasses and found strong seasonal effects in our data; however, surprisingly, we found no effect of RIFA control on vertebrate scavenging efficiency, rates of carcass detection, carcass persistence, or the richness of local scavengers. Rather, we observed a highly efficient vertebrate scavenging community that assimilated 87.4% of carcasses during our study. This high rate of vertebrate scavenging efficiency was maintained in both control (93.0%) and RIFA treatment (81.8%) sites, suggesting presence of abundant RIFA populations did not limit vertebrate acquisition of carrion. Future research should focus on the interactions of RIFA with the remaining invertebrate scavenging community to further investigate whether RIFA impact the assimilation of carrion resources within invertebrate communities.

Fire influences the distributions of cover and food resources for ungulates in frequently burned systems. Fire typically improves forage quality, and as a result, herbivores are often drawn to recently burned areas–a response termed the ‘magnet effect.’ Thus, fire can be an important tool for manipulating vegetation to benefit wildlife. However, most studies of ungulate responses to fire occur at broad temporal scales (multiple years post-burn), and the immediate effects of fire on ungulates are poorly understood. While conducting a study of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) in southern Florida, we were able to evaluate a natural experiment investigating the effects of wildfire on the spatial ecology of deer. In May 2015, the Mud Lake Fire Complex burned approximately 10,250 ha in Big Cypress National Preserve. This area included portions of the home ranges of 19 of 79 deer that we were monitoring via GPS-telemetry and permitted a Before-After-Control-Impact design to investigate if fire altered the area of use and movement rates of deer at 1, 2, and 3 months following fire compared to the month before the fire. Relative to the white-tailed deer in the unburned areas, white-tailed deer in the burned areas increased movement rates, potentially because fire reduced concealment cover, resulting in increased predator detection and decreased predation risk. Counter to our predictions that fire would increase forage quality and result in decreased space use, white-tailed deer exposed to the fire increased their space use following the fire when compared to deer whose home range did not include burned areas. This appeared to be the outcome of balancing competing demands for site fidelity and to increase access to improved forage in the recently burned areas. In general, deer exposed to the fire increased their use of the burned area following the fire, but also maintained portions of their home ranges that were not burned. Our results provide a behavioral confirmation that white-tailed deer are attracted to recently burned areas and that they respond rapidly to the alteration of vegetation.

Geomys pinetis (Southeastern pocket gopher) is a fossorial rodent historically associated with Pinus palustris (longleaf pine) communities. Conversion and fragmentation of longleaf pine communities have reduced quality and quantity of southeastern pocket gopher habitat. It is therefore important to determine characteristics of suitable habitat for future conservation efforts focusing on maintaining or restoring appropriate habitat conditions. We quantified understory vegetation structure (i.e., ground cover categories) and soil characteristics (i.e., soil texture, pH, nitrogen, and carbon at multiple depths) in areas with and without pocket gopher activity. We evaluated a suite of models to determine whether understory vegetation structure, soil characteristics, or a combination of vegetation and soil characteristics were better predictors of gopher presence. Soil characteristics predicted pocket gopher presence better than understory vegetation structure with the best overall model combining per...

The southeastern pocket gopher Geomys pinetis is absent from a large portion of its historical range. Translocation may represent a viable management technique to reestablish populations into suitable habitat. However, several aspects of the species' ecology are poorly understood, making development of an effective translocation approach challenging. Therefore, we used radiotelemetry to examine home range, survival, dispersal, and daily activity patterns of the southeastern pocket gopher in southwestern Georgia. We measured soil and vegetation characteristics within individual home ranges and examined relationships between home range size, habitat variables, and body mass. Mean home range size of 17 radio-tagged pocket gophers was 921.9 m2 (range = 43.4–2246.8 m2). Home range size was positively related to body mass, percent silt at a depth of 25 cm, and soil carbon content at 75 cm and was negatively related to percent sand at 25 cm, percent clay at 50 cm, and ground cover of grasses other than wiregrass Aristida beyrichiana. Survival rate was 0.78 (range = 0.50–1.00) over the 51-wk study, and we documented predation, likely by avian predators, on two individuals. Three individuals dispersed, with a maximum dispersal distance of 319.1 m (range = 143.2–319.1 m), the farthest known southeastern pocket gopher dispersal. Pocket gophers exhibited greater activity from 0000 to 0400 hours and from 1600 to 2000 hours, contrasting previous research that southeastern pocket gophers were equally active throughout the diel period. Our home range size estimates for southeastern pocket gophers are the first determined using radiotelemetry and are considerably smaller than previous estimates. Although we documented dispersal distances more than 300 m, the fragmented nature of current and restored habitats likely will prevent large-scale natural colonization. Our results provide information important for maximizing success in future southeastern pocket gopher translocation efforts.

Many sympatric species use Gopherus polyphemus (Gopher Tortoise) burrows as refugia from predators, extreme temperatures, and fire. As part of an ongoing project involving trail-camera monitoring at Gopher Tortoise burrows, we observed a Sciurus niger (Eastern Fox Squirrel) sheltering in an occupied burrow twice in a single day. Eastern Fox Squirrels primarily forage on the ground, and Gopher Tortoise burrows likely offer refuge from avian predators but could expose Eastern Fox Squirrels to increased predation risk from mammalian and reptilian predators. Alternatively, the squirrel may have been seeking refuge from higher-than-average temperatures. Our observation further demonstrates the importance of Gopher Tortoise burrows to vertebrate fauna in the southeastern United States.

Carrion is a valuable resource used by facultative scavengers across the globe. Due to conflicts with humans, many vertebrate scavengers have experienced population declines due to direct persecution or indirect effects of human activities. However, little is known about the implications of altered scavenger community composition on the fate and efficiency of carrion removal within ecosystems. In particular, mammalian mesopredators are efficient scavengers that are often subjected to control, thus, it is important to understand how the reduction of this scavenger guild influences the fate of carrion resources and efficiency of carrion removal within ecosystems. We evaluated the influence of the absence of mammalian mesopredators on vertebrate scavenging dynamics by comparing the efficiency of carrion removal and species composition at carrion between sites where we experimentally manipulated mesopredator abundance and paired control sites. Overall scavenging rates were high, even within our mesopredator exclusion sites (79% of carcasses). Despite the exclusion of an entire guild of dominant scavengers, we saw little effect on scavenging dynamics due to the extensive acquisition of carrion by avian scavengers. However, we observed a slight reduction in vertebrate scavenging efficiency in sites where mesopredators were excluded. Our results suggest vertebrate communities are highly efficient at carrion removal, as we saw a functional response by avian scavengers to increased carrion availability. These data provide insights into the impact of mesopredator control on food web dynamics, and build upon the growing body of knowledge investigating the role of vertebrate scavengers on ecosystem services provided through carrion removal.

Numerous vertebrate species including Pituophis spp. (pine snakes) and birds of prey have been shown to consume Geomys pinetis (Southeastern Pocket Gopher), but its full spectrum of predators remains undocumented. As a part of a larger project involving radiotracking Southeastern Pocket Gophers in southwestern Georgia, a female Pocket Gopher was consumed by a Crotalus horridus (Timber Rattlesnake) while making an aboveground movement. Timber Rattlesnakes are a previously undocumented predator for Southeastern Pocket Gophers. Our observation further demonstrates predation risks associated with aboveground movement.

Anthropogenically modified systems tend to have homogenous wildlife communities. While this process is well documented, the mechanisms driving the convergence of species in human-modified systems are unclear. There are at least two compelling ecological explanations for the loss of specialized species in these settings; changes to the distribution and quality of resources (i.e. environmental conditions) and changes to competitive interactions. Without a better understanding of the mechanisms behind biotic homogenization, it is difficult to take appropriate conservation and management actions to maintain diverse communities. We investigated the roles of environmental conditions and competition in driving biotic homogenization in one of the world's most imperiled ecosystems; the longleaf pine (Pinus palustris) savanna of the American Southeast. Specifically, we investigated how generalist gray squirrels (Sciurus carolinensis) are replacing the more specialized fox squirrels (S. niger) in shrub and hardwood encroached Southeastern savannas. To test how changes to habitat and competition affect the specialist fox squirrel, we undertook a landscape scale manipulation. We experimentally manipulated competition by removing gray squirrels from closed-canopy patches embedded in longleaf pine savanna. Fox squirrels showed a strong response to gray squirrel removal, increasing their activity by 300% in the interior of closed-canopy patches. Fox squirrels in control patches did not use the interior of closed-canopy patches. Our experimental results support the hypothesis that biotic homogenization occurs when human-induced changes to the environment alter competitive interactions.

Despite numerous studies estimating gray fox Urocyon cinereoargenteus home range sizes, there have been few studies to evaluate more nuanced space use patterns; thus little is known about gray fox spatial ecology beyond estimates of home range size. We used GPS-technology to track 34 gray foxes (20 males and 14 females) from February 2014 until December 2015 in southwestern Georgia, USA. Home range sizes were similar among seasons (p > 0.05), but core area sizes were smaller during spring than during winter and summer (p < 0.05). As would be expected, home range overlap was much greater between mated pairs than among neighboring animals and core area overlap among neighbors did not occur. Members of a mated pair apparently interacted frequently, with 29.4% of all simultaneous locations occurring within 40 m of each other. Members of mated pairs interacted more diurnally during spring (49.9%) which is concurrent with denning, than during summer (31.5%), while nocturnal interactions were similar during spring (18.0%) and summer (19.3%). We recorded 25 extra-territorial forays from 10 of 26 gray foxes. Three male foxes were responsible for nearly half (12) of these forays. Because these forays took place during the breeding season, we suggest males may have been seeking extra-pair copulations.