Abstract
Geoffroy’s cat is a small Neotropical felid, seemingly abundant throughout most of its range and exhibiting considerable ecological plasticity. In Brazil, the species is restricted to the Pampas, one of the most threatened biomes in the country, where information on its ecology is scarce. Here we report the first assessments of its density, habitat selection, and activity patterns in Brazil. The study was conducted in human-dominated landscape at the extreme south of the country. Using Spatially Explicit Capture- Recapture (SECR) analyses, the estimated population density ranged from 34.54 (±13.51 SE), based on camera trap and radio-telemetry data, to 41.78 (±16.12 SE) individuals/100 km2, based only on camera trap data. A Resource Selection Function (RSF) analysis showed that our study population selected sites with native forest and rivers, and avoided areas close to roads, which probably implies avoidance of human contact. Although we observed a slight increase in its nocturnal activity during spring-summer with respect to fall-winter, this population was predominantly nocturnal throughout the year. The use of grasslands and croplands (non-protected areas) was non-uniformly distributed through the hours of the day, whereas native forest was used more uniformly.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References References
Akaike, H., 1974. A new look at the statistical model identification. IEEE T. Automat. Contr. 19 (6), 716–723, https://doi.org/10.1109/TAC.1974.1100705.
Benzaquín, M., B.Sc. thesis 2008. Área De Acción Del Gato Montés (Leopardus Geoffroyi), En Una Zona De La Provincia Fitogeográfica Del Espinal. Chasicó, Pdo. De Villarino. Buenos Aires. Departamento of Biology, Biochemistry and Pharmacy, Universidad Nacional del Litoral, Santa Fé, Argentina.
Balme, G.A., Hunter, L.T.B., Slotow, R., 2009. Evaluating methods for counting cryptic carnivores. J. Wildlife Manage. 73, 433–441, https://doi.org/10.2193/2007–368.
Bates, D., Maechler, M., Bolker, B., Walker, S., 2015. Fitting linear mixed-effects models using lme4. J. Stat. Softw. 67 (1), 1–48, https://doi.org/10.18637/jss.v067.i01.
Boldrini, I.I., 2009. A Flora dos Campos do Rio Grande do Sul. In: Pillar, V.P., Müller, S.C., Castilhos, Z.M.S., Jacques, A.V.A. (Eds.), Campos Sulinos — Conservacão E Uso Sustentável Da Biodiversidade. MMA, Brasília, pp. 63–77.
Calenge, C, 2006. The package adehabitat for the R software: a tool for the analysis of space and habitat use by animals. Ecol. Model. 197, 516–519, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2006.03.017.
Caruso, N., Manfredi, C., Luengos Vidal, E.M., Casanave, E.B., Lucherini, M., 2012. First density estimation of two sympatric small cats, Leopardus colocolo and Leopardus geoffroyi, in a scrubland area of central Argentina. Annal. Zool. Fennici. 49, 18–191, https://doi.org/10.5735/086.049.0306.
Caruso, N., Lucherini, M., Fortin, D., Casanave, E.B., 2016. Species-Specific responses of carnivores to human-induced landscape changes in Central Argentina. PLoS One 11 (3), e0150488, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0150488.
Castillo, D., Luengos Vidal, E., Caruso, N., Manfredi, C, Lucherini, M., Casanave, E.B., 2019. Spatial organization and habitat selection of the Geoffroy’s cat in the Espinal of central Argentina. Mamm. Biol. 94, 30–37, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mambio.2018.12.003.
Castillo, D., Luengos Vidal, E., Lucherini, M., Casanave, E.B., 2008. First report on the Geoffroy’s cat in a highly modified rural area of the Argentine Pampas. Cat news 49, 27–28.
Ciuti, S., Northrup, J.M., Muhly, T.B., Simi, S., Musiani, M., Pitt, J., Boyce, M., 2012. Effects of humans on behaviour of wildlife exceed those of natural predators in a landscape of fear. PLoS One 7 (11), e50611, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0050611.
Cuellar, E., Maffei, L., Arispe, R., Noss, A., 2006. Geoffroy’s cat at the northern limit of their range: activity patterns and density estimates from camera trapping in Bolivian dry forest. Stud. Neotrop. Fauna Enrviron. 41, 169–177, https://doi.org/10.1080/01650520600840001.
Cuyckens, G.A.E., Pereira, J.A., Trigo, T.C., Da Silva, M., Goncalves, L., Huaranca, J.C., Bou, N.P., Cartes, J.L., Eizirik, E., 2016. Refined assessment of the geographic distribution of Geoffroy’s cat (Leopardus geoffroyi) (Mammalia: felidae) in the Neotropics. J. Zool. 298, 285–292, https://doi.org/10.1111/jzo.12312.
Efford, M.G., Available from https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=secr (Accessed 9 March 2018) 2018. Secr: Spatially Explicit Capture-recapture Models. R Package Version 3.1.6.
Environmental Systems Research Institute-ESRI, 2016. ArcGIS 10.4.1 Desktop. Environmental Systems Research Institute, Redlands, CA.
Espinosa, C.C., Trigo, T.C., Tirelli, F.P., da Silva, L.G., Eizirik, E., Queirolo, D., et al., 2017. Geographic distribution modeling of the margay (Leopardus wiedii) and jaguarundi (Pumayagouaroundi): a comparative assessment. J. Mammal. 99, 252–262, https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyx152.
Fisher, N.I., 1993. Statistical Analysis of Circular Data. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Frid, A., Dill, L.M., 2002. Human-caused disturbance stimuli as a form of predation risk. Avian Conserv. Ecol. 6 (1), 11, https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-00404–060111.
Guadagnin, P.M.A., Trentin, R., da Silva Alves, F., 2015. Relacão entre as variáveis Geomorfométricas e a Vegetacão Florestal na bacia hidrográfica do arroio caverá-oeste do RS. Rev. Dep. Geo. 29, 246–261, https://doi.org/10.11606/rdg.v29i0.102131.
IUCN, Available from www.iucnredlist.org (Accessed 10 January 2019) 2019. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Ver. 2019.1.
Johnson, D.H., 1980. The comparison of usage and availability measurements for evaluating resource preference. Ecology 61 (1), 65–71, https://doi.org/10.2307/1937156.
Johnson, W.E., Franklin, W.L., 1991. Feeding and spatial ecology of Felis geoffroyi in Southern Patagonia. J. Mammal. 72 (4), 815–820, https://doi.org/10.2307/1381848.
Kovach, W.L., 2013. Oriana 4.02 for Windows. Kovach Computing Services, Pentraeth.
Luengos Vidal, E., Sillero-Zubiri, C., Marino, J., Casanave, E., Lucherini, M., 2012. Spatial organization of the Pampas fox in a grassland relict of central Argentina: a flexible system. J. Zool. 287, 133–141, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469–7998.2011.00896.x.
Macdonald, D.W., Loveridge, A.J., 2010. Biology and Conservation of Wild Felids. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Manfredi, C, Soler, L., Lucherini, M., Casanave, E.B., 2006. Home range and habitat use by Geoffroy’s cat (Oncifelis geoffroyi) in a wet grassland in Argentina. J. Zool. 268, 381–387, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469–7998.2005.00033.x.
Manfredi, C., Lucherini, M., Soler, L., Baglioni, J., Vidal, E.L., Casanave, E.B., 2011. Activity and movement patterns of Geoffroy’s cat in the grasslands of Argentina. Mammal. Biol 76 (3), 313–319, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mambio.2011.01.009.
Manfredi, C., Vidal, E.L., Castillo, D.F., Lucherini, M., Casanave, E.B., 2012. Home range size and habitat selection of Geoffroyi’s cat (Leopardus geoffroyi), Felidae, Carnivora) in the pampas grassland. J. Zool. 76 (1), 105–108, https://doi.org/10.1515/mammalia-2011–0039Mammalia.
Meredith, M., Ridout, M., 2014. Overview of the overlap package. R. Proj., 1–9.
Nimer, E., 1989. Climatologia Do Brasil. Fundacão IBGE, Rio de Janeiro.
Nowell, K., Jackson, P., 1996. Wild cats: Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan. IUCN, Gland.
Patil, M.B., Desai, C.G., Umrikar, B.N., 2012. Image classification tool for land use/land cover analysis: a comparative study of maximum likelihood and minimum distance method. Int. J. Geol. Earth Environ. Sci. 2 (3), 189–196.
Pereira, J.A., Fracassi, N.G., Uhart, M.M., 2006. Numerical and spatial responses of Geoffroyi’s cat (Oncifelis geoffroyi) to prey decline in Argentina. J. Mammal. 87, 1132–1139, https://doi.org/10.1644/05-MAMM-A-333R2.1.
Pereira, J.A., 2010. Activity pattern of Geoffroy’s cats (Leopardus geoffroyi) during a period of food shortage. J. Arid Environ. 74, 1106–1109, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaridenv.2010.03.017.
Pereira, J.A., Di Bitetti, M.S., Fracassi, N.G., Paviolo, A., De Angelo, C.D., Di Blanco, Y.E., Novaro, A.J., 2011. Population density of Geoffroy’s cat in scrublands of central Argentina. J. Zool. 283 (1), 37–44, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469–7998.2010.00746.x.
Pereira, J.A., Walker, R.S., Novaro, A.J., 2012. Effects of livestock on the feeding and spatial ecology of Geoffroy’s cat. J. Arid Environ. 76, 36–42, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaridenv.2011.08.006.
Pereira, J., Lucherini, M., Trigo, T., Available from https://doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2015–2.RLTS.T15310A50657011.en (Accessed 8 November 2018) 2015. Leopardus geoffroyi. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2015: e.T15310A50657011.
R Development Core Team, Available from http://R-project.org/ (Accessed 20 August 2016) 2015. R: a Language and Environment for Statistical Computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria.
Ridout, M.S., Linkie, M., 2009. Estimating overlap of daily activity patterns from camera trap data. J. Agr. Biol. Envir. St. 14 (3), 322–337, https://doi.org/10.1198/jabes.2009.08038.
Robinson, T.P., Wint, G.W., Conchedda, G., Van Boeckel, T.P., Ercoli, V., Palamara, E., et al., 2014. Mapping the global distribution of livestock. PLoS One 9 (5), e96084, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0096084.
Royle, J.A., Chandler, R.B., Sollmann, R., Gardner, B., 2013. Spatial Capture-recapture. Academic Press, Waltham.
Rytwinski, T., Fahrig, L., 2012. Do species life history traits explain population responses to roads? A meta-analysis. Biol. Cons 147 (1), 87–98, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2011.11.023.
Sikes, R.S., 2016. The animal care and use committee of the american society of mammalogists. Guidelines of the american society of mammalogists for the use of wild mammals in research and education. J. Mammal. 97, 663–688, https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyw078.
Soler, L, Lucherini, M., Manfredi, C., Ciuccio, M., Casanave, E.B., 2009. Characteristics of defecation sites of the Geoffroys cat Leopardus geoffroyi. Mastozool. Neotrop. 16 (2), 485–489.
Sousa, K.S., Bager, A., 2008. Feeding habits of Geoffroy’s cat (Leopardus geoffroyi) in southern Brazil. Mamm. Biol. 73 (4), 303–308, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mambio.2007.04.001.
Soutullo, Á., Sosa, B., Scarlato, G., 2010. Especies prioritarias para la conservación en Uruguay, 2009
Tirelli, F.P., Trigo, T.C., Trinca, C.S., Albano, A.P.N., Mazim, F.D., Queirolo, D., et al., 2018. Spatial organization and social dynamics of Geoffroy’s cat in the Brazilian pampas. J. Mammal. 99 (4), 859–873, https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyy064.
Trigo, T.C., Tirelli, F.P., Machado, L.F., Peters, F.B., Indrusiak, C.B., Mazim, F.D., et al., 2013. Geographic distribution and food habits of Leopardus tigrinus and L. Geoffroyi (Carnivora, Felidae) at their geographic contact zone in southern Brazil. Stud. Neotrop. Fauna Environ. 48 (1), 56–67, https://doi.org/10.1080/01650521.2013.774789.
Walter, W.D., Fischer, J.W., 2016. Manual of Applied Spatial Ecology. Walter Applied Spatial Ecology Lab. Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Available from https://ecosystems.psu.edu/research/labs/walter-lab/manual (Accessed 06 April 2018).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Tirelli, F.P., Mazim, F.D., Crawshaw, P.G. et al. Density and spatio-temporal behaviour of Geoffroy’s cats in a human-dominated landscape of southern Brazil. Mamm Biol 99, 128–135 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mambio.2019.11.003
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mambio.2019.11.003