Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Past, present and future of wild ungulates in relation to changes in land use

  • Research Article
  • Published:
Landscape Ecology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

In recent decades, Mediterranean landscapes have been experiencing more rapid changes in land use than usual, which have affected the ecology of the species inhabiting this biodiversity hotspot. Some studies have assessed the effect of such changes on biodiversity, but most of these were diachronic studies of population dynamics, or synchronic studies of species habitat selection, whereas few studies have simultaneously taken into account temporal changes in habitat composition and changes in species distribution. This study analysed the effects of land-use changes on the distribution of wild ungulates (Capreolus capreolus, Capra pyrenaica, Cervus elaphus and Sus scrofa). Using favourability function and Markov chain analysis combined with cellular automata, we addressed the following objectives: (i) to examine the environmental determinants of ungulate distribution in the past (1960s) and present (1990s), (ii) to model land use for 2040 to forecast future species distributions and (iii) to assess the biogeographical differences between the above-mentioned study periods (past–present and present–future). Species favourability was predicted to be more widely distributed in the present than in the past, but this increase varied across species. Areas predicted to be favourable in the present should remain stable in the future, but in addition there will be more new favourable areas not previously occupied by these species. The results are discussed from the perspective of the socio-economic relevance of wild ungulates in relation to some unfavourable areas of Mediterranean regions.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Subscribe and save

Springer+ Basic
$34.99 /Month
  • Get 10 units per month
  • Download Article/Chapter or eBook
  • 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
  • Cancel anytime
Subscribe now

Buy Now

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Acevedo P, Cassinello J (2009a) Human-induced range expansion of wild ungulates causes niche overlap between previously allopatric species: red deer and Iberian ibex in mountainous regions of southern Spain. Ann Zool Fenn 46:39–50

    Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo P, Cassinello J (2009b) Biology, ecology and status of Iberian ibex Capra pyrenaica: a critical review and research prospectus. Mammal Rev 39:17–32

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo P, Delibes-Mateos M, Escudero MA, Vicente J, Marco J, Gortázar C (2005) Environmental constraints in the colonization sequence of roe deer (Capreolus capreolus Linnaeus, 1758) across the Iberian Mountains, Spain. J Biogeogr 32:1671–1680

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo P, Escudero MA, Muñoz R, Gortázar C (2006) Factors affecting wild boar abundance across an environmental gradient in Spain. Acta Theriol 51:327–336

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo P, Cassinello J, Gortázar C (2007a) The Iberian ibex is under an expansion trend but displaced to suboptimal habitats by the presence of extensive goat livestock in central Spain. Biodivers Conserv 16:3361–3376

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo P, Vicente J, Hofle U, Cassinello J, Ruiz-Fons F, Gortázar C (2007b) Estimation of European wild boar relative abundance and aggregation: a novel method in epidemiological risk assessment. Epidemiol Infect 135:519–527

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo P, Ruiz-Fons F, Vicente J, Reyes-García AR, Alzaga V, Gortázar C (2008) Estimating red deer abundance in a wide range of management situations in Mediterranean habitats. J Zool 276:37–47

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo P, Ward AI, Real R, Smith GC (2010) Assessing biogeographical relationships of ecologically related species using favourability functions: a case study on British deer. Divers Distrib 16:515–528

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Agarwal C, Green GM, Grove JM, Evans TP, Schweik CM (2002) A review and assessment of land-use change models: dynamics of space, time, and human choice. UFS Technical Report NE-297. U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service, Northeastern Forest Research Station, Burlington, VT

  • Araújo MB, Nogués-Bravo D, Reginster I, Rounsevell M, Whittaker RJ (2007) Exposure to European biodiversity to changes in human-induced pressures. Environ Sci Policy 11:38–45

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barbosa AM, Real R, Vargas JM (2009) Transferability of environmental favourability models in geographic space: the case of the Iberian desman (Galemys pyrenaicus) in Portugal and Spain. Ecol Model 220:747–754

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Borcard D, Legendre P, Drapeau P (1992) Partialling out the spatial component of ecological variation. Ecology 73:1045–1055

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bouma J, Varallyay G, Batjes NH (1998) Principal land use changes anticipated in Europe. Agric Ecosyst Environ 67:103–119

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Calenge C, Maillard D, Fournier P, Fouque C (2004) Efficiency of spreading maize in the garrigues to reduce wild boar (Sus scrofa) damage to Mediterranean vineyard. Eur J Wildl Res 50:112–120

    Google Scholar 

  • Conway TM, Lathrop RG Jr (2005) Modeling the ecological consequences of land-use policies in an urbanizing region. Environ Manag 35:278–291

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Deadman P, Brown RD (1993) Modelling rural residential settlement patterns with cellular automata. J Environ Manag 37:147–160

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Delibes-Mateos M, Farfán MA, Olivero J, Márquez AL, Vargas JM (2009) Long-term changes in game species over a long period of transformation in the Iberian Mediterranean landscape. Environ Manag 43:1256–1268

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Diniz-Filho JAF, Bini LM, Hawkins BA (2003) Spatial autocorrelation and red herrings in geographical ecology. Glob Ecol Biogeogr 12:53–64

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eastman JR (2004) Idrisi Kilimanjaro GIS, user guide and software. Clark Labs, Clark University, USA

    Google Scholar 

  • Falcucci A, Maiorano L, Boitani L (2007) Changes in land-use/land-cover patterns in Italy and their implications for biodiversity conservation. Landscape Ecol 22:617–631

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Farfán MA, Vargas JM, Duarte J, Real R (2009) Improving management plans by downscaling hunting yield models: a case study with the red-legged partridge Alectoris rufa in southern Spain. Wildl Biol 15:1–12

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Farr TG, Kobrick M (2000) Shuttle Radar Topography Mission produces a wealth of data. EOS Trans Am Geophys Union 81:583–585

    Google Scholar 

  • Fernández-Alés R, Martín A, Ortega F, Alés EE (1992) Recent changes in landscape structure and function in a Mediterranean region of SW of Spain (1950–1984). Landscape Ecol 7:3–18

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fielding AH, Bell JF (1997) A review of methods for the assessment of prediction errors in conservation presence/absence models. Environ Conserv 24:38–49

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gil-Tena A, Brotons L, Saura S (2009) Mediterranean forest dynamics and forest bird distribution changes in the late 20th century. Glob Change Biol 15:474–485

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gordon IJ (2009) What is the future for wild, large herbivores in human-modified agricultural landscapes? Wildl Biol 15:1–9

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gortázar C, Herrero J, Villafuerte R, Marco J (2000) Historical examination of the status of large mammals in Aragon, Spain. Mammalia 64:411–422

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gortázar C, Acevedo P, Ruiz-Fons F, Vicente J (2006) Disease risk and overabundance of game species. Eur J Wildl Res 52:81–87

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Graham MH (2003) Confronting multicollinearity in ecological multiple regression. Ecology 84:2809–2815

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hewison AJM, Vincent JP, Joachim J, Angibault JM, Cargnelutti B, Cibien C (2001) The effects of woodland fragmentation and human activity on roe deer distribution in agricultural landscapes. Can J Zool 79:679–689

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hosmer DW, Lemeshow S (1989) Applied logistic regression. Wiley, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Junta de Andalucía (2009) Mapa de usos y coberturas vegetales de Andalucía 1956-1999-2003, escala 1:25,000. Consejería de Medio Ambiente, Sevilla

  • Lambin EF, Geist H (eds) (2006) Land-use and land-cover change: local processes and global impacts. Springer-Verlag, Berlin

    Google Scholar 

  • Lambin EF, Turner BL, Geist HJ, Agbola SB, Angelsen A, Bruce JW, Coomes OT, Dirzo R, Fischer G, Folke C, George PS, Homewood K, Imbernon J, Leemansm R, Li X, Moran EF, Mortimore M, Ramakrishnan PS, Richard JF, Skanes H, Steffen W, Stone GD, Svedin U, Veldkamp TA, Vogel C, Xu J (2001) The causes of land-use and land-cover change: moving beyond the myths. Glob Environ Change 11:261–269

    Google Scholar 

  • Legendre P (1993) Spatial autocorrelation: trouble or new paradigm? Ecology 74:1659–1673

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Levinsky I, Skov F, Svenning JC, Rahbek C (2007) Potential impacts of climate change on the distributions and diversity patterns of European mammals. Biodivers Conserv 16:3803–3816

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lobo JM, Jiménez-Valverde A, Real R (2008) AUC: a misleading measure of the performance of predictive distribution models. Glob Ecol Biogeogr 17:145–151

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lucio A (1991) Ordenación y gestión en caza menor. In: Fuentes A, Sánchez I, Pajuelo L (eds) Manual de ordenación y gestión cinegética. IFEBA, Badajoz, pp 219–255

    Google Scholar 

  • Lütolf M, Bolliger J, Kienast F, Guisan A (2009) Scenario-based assessment of future land use change on butterfly species distributions. Biodivers Conserv 18:1329–1347

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Miller J, Franklin J (2002) Modeling the distribution of four vegetation alliances using generalized linear models and classification trees with spatial dependence. Ecol Model 157:227–247

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Millington JDA, Perry GLW, Romero-Calcerrada R (2007) Regression techniques for examining land use/cover change: a case study of a Mediterranean landscape. Ecosystems 10:562–578

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Milner JM, Bonenfant C, Mysterud A, Gaillard JM, Csányi S, Stenseth NC (2006) Temporal and spatial development of red deer harvesting in Europe: biological and cultural factors. J Appl Ecol 43:721–734

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Moreira F, Russo D (2007) Modelling the impact of agricultural abandonment and wildfires on vertebrate diversity in Mediterranean Europe. Landscape Ecol 22:1461–1476

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nakicenovic N, Alcamo J, Davis G, de Vries B, Fenhann J, Gaffin S, Gregory K, Grübler A, Jung TY, Kram T, La Rover EL, Michaelis L, Mori S, Morita T, Pepper W, Pitcher H, Price L, Raihi K, Roehrl A, Rogner HH, Sankovski A, Schlesinger M, Shukla P, Smith S, Swart R, van Rooijen S, Victor N, Dadi Z (2000) IPCC special report on emissions scenarios. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

  • Pérez JM, Granados JE, Soriguer RC, Fandos P, Marquez FJ, Crampe JP (2002) Distribution, status and conservation problems of the Spanish Ibex, Capra pyrenaica (Mammalia: Artiodactyla). Mammal Rev 32:26–39

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Peterson LK, Bergen KM, Brown DG, Vashchuk L, Blam Y (2009) Forested land-cover patterns and trends over changing forest management eras in the Siberian Baikal region. For Ecol Manag 257:911–922

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pocewicz A, Nielsen-Pincus M, Goldberg CS, Johnson MH, Morgan P, Force JE, Waits LP, Vierling L (2008) Predicting land use change: comparison of models based on landowner surveys and historical land cover trends. Landscape Ecol 23:195–210

    Google Scholar 

  • Real R, Barbosa AM, Porras D, Kin MS, Máquez AL, Guerrero JC, Palomo LJ, Justo ER, Vargas JM (2003) Relative importance of environment, human activity and spatial situation in determining the distribution of terrestrial mammal diversity in Argentina. J Biogeogr 30:939–947

    Google Scholar 

  • Real R, Barbosa AM, Vargas JM (2006) Obtaining environmental favourability functions from logistic regression. Environ Ecol Stat 13:237–245

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Real R, Márquez AL, Olivero J, Estrada A (2010) Are species distribution models in climate warming scenarios useful for informing emission policy planning? An uncertainty assessment using fuzzy logic. Ecography 33:304–314

    Google Scholar 

  • Sirami C, Brotons L, Martin JL (2009) Do bird spatial distribution patterns reflect population trends in changing landscapes? Landscape Ecol 24:893–906

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Suarez-Seoane S, Osborne PE, Baudry J (2002) Responses of birds of different biogeographic origins and habitat requirements to agricultural land abandonment in northern Spain. Biol Conserv 105:333–344

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thuiller W, Alberta C, Araújo MB, Berry PM, Cabeza M, Guisan A, Hickler T, Midgley GF, Paterson J, Schurr FM, Sykes MT, Zimmermann NE (2008) Predicting global change impacts on plant species’ distributions: future challenges. Perspect Plant Ecol 9:137–152

    Google Scholar 

  • Trees B, Trees G (2003) Scenario visualization for participatory landscape planning—a study from Denmark. Landsc Urban Plan 64:161–178

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • US Geological Survey (1996) GTOPO30. Land processes distributed active archive center (LPDAAC), EROS Data Center. http://edcdaac.usgs.gov/gtopo30/gtopo30.asp.

  • Vargas JM, Guerrero JC, Farfán MA, Barbosa AM, Real R (2006) Land use and environmental factors affecting red-legged partridge (Alectoris rufa) hunting yields in southern Spain. Eur J Wildl Res 52:188–195

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vargas JM, Farfán MA, Guerrero JC, Barbosa AM, Real R (2007) Geographical and environmental correlates of big and small game in Andalusia (southern Spain). Wildl Res 34:498–506

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Virkkala R, Heikkinen RK, Leikola N, Luoto M (2008) Projected large-scale range reductions of norther-boreal land bird species due to climate change. Biol Conserv 141:1343–1353

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vitousek PM, Mooney HA, Lubchenco J, Melillo JM (1997) Human domination of Earth’s ecosystem. Science 277:494–499

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ward AI (2005) Expanding ranges of wild and feral deer in Great Britain. Mammal Rev 35:165–173

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zadeh LA (1965) Fuzzy sets. Inf Control 8:338–353

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zhao S, Peng C, Jiang H, Tian D, Lei X, Zhou X (2006) Land use change in Asia and the ecological consequences. Ecol Res 21:890–896

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zuur AF, Ieno EN, Elphick CS (2010) A protocol for data exploration to avoid common statistical problems. Methods Ecol Evol 1:3–14

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

Our gratitude to two anonymous reviewers and Dean Anderson for their useful comments and suggestions on a previous version of the manuscript. Funding was provided by the project CGL2009-11316/BOS—FEDER. Special thanks go to E. Martínez for providing us with the maps of the species abundance for 1960s, and to the Junta de Andalucía for supplying the Annual Hunting Reports. We extend special thanks to J. Olivero for ideas and discussions on methodological aspects. P. Acevedo and M. Delibes-Mateos are currently holding a Juan de la Cierva research contract awarded by the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación—Fondo Social Europeo.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Biogeography, Diversity, and Conservation Research Team, Department of Animal Biology, Faculty of Sciences, University of Malaga, 29071, Malaga, Spain

    Pelayo Acevedo, Ana Luz Márquez, Raimundo Real & Juan Mario Vargas

  2. Biogea Consultores, Malaga, Spain

    Miguel Ángel Farfán

  3. Instituto de Investigación en Recursos Cinegéticos, IREC (CSIC-UCLM-JCCM), Ciudad Real, Spain

    Miguel Delibes-Mateos

Authors
  1. Pelayo Acevedo
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Miguel Ángel Farfán
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Ana Luz Márquez
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Miguel Delibes-Mateos
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Raimundo Real
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Juan Mario Vargas
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Pelayo Acevedo.

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

(DOC 177 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Acevedo, P., Farfán, M.Á., Márquez, A.L. et al. Past, present and future of wild ungulates in relation to changes in land use. Landscape Ecol 26, 19–31 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-010-9538-2

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-010-9538-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation