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How effective are buffer zones in managing invasive beavers in Patagonia? A simulation study

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Abstract

In an age of invasions, it is critical to design and test management strategies to more efficiently control foreign species. Spatially explicit individual based models (SEIBMs) are a powerful tool to explore different management scenarios to control invaders, but we rarely have enough data to parameterize these models, particularly for relatively long-lived species. Here we take advantage of our previous work estimating demographic rates of invasive beavers in Patagonia, and develop an SEIBM to model the spread of beavers in Patagonia. We used our SEIBM both to estimate dispersal distances by fitting their observed rate of spread and to test how placing a buffer zone (a longitudinal strip of land perpendicular to the direction of spread within which a fraction of beavers are culled) beyond the invasion front would work as a control strategy. Specifically, we explored six different scenarios with two different culling rates and two buffer zone widths. We found that beavers in Patagonia must disperse long distances on average to account for the observed rate of spread, and thus our model predicts that a 100 km buffer zone will be needed to slow (but likely not halt) the spread of beavers. Interestingly, culling a higher proportion of beavers within a 100 km buffer zone (90 vs. 60%) did not improve buffer zone performance. Our study shows that wide buffer zones can slow (but likely not halt) continental spread of beavers in Patagonia and potentially pave the way for beaver eradication.

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Acknowledgements

The authors want to thank Julio Escobar for his valuable comments on the conceptual design and development of the individual based simulations and Mariano Gonzalez Roglich who helped to build the GIS landscapes used in our simulations. This work was funded by Cleveland Metroparks Zoo, CREOI (Conservation and Research Opportunities International), Duke Graduate School and the Rufford Foundation.

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Author notes

  1. Alejandro G. Pietrek

    Present address: Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, 32611, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27708, USA

    Alejandro G. Pietrek, Gina K. Himes Boor & William F. Morris

Authors
  1. Alejandro G. Pietrek
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  2. Gina K. Himes Boor
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  3. William F. Morris
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Correspondence to Alejandro G. Pietrek.

Additional information

Communicated by B. D. Hoffmann.

This article belongs to the Topical Collection: Invasive species.

Appendix

Appendix

See Figs. 6 and 7.

Fig. 6
figure 6

Distribution of dispersal distances of successful crossings with a 100 km width buffer zone under different culling scenarios

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Fig. 7
figure 7

Distribution of time of first arrival to the other side of the 100 km buffer zone under different culling scenarios

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Pietrek, A.G., Himes Boor, G.K. & Morris, W.F. How effective are buffer zones in managing invasive beavers in Patagonia? A simulation study. Biodivers Conserv 26, 2591–2605 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-017-1373-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-017-1373-1

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