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Identifying priority areas for landscape connectivity for three large carnivores in northwestern Mexico and southwestern United States

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Abstract

Context

Large carnivores are crucial to ecosystem functioning, as they enhance the biodiversity of the native communities in which they live. However, most large carnivores are threatened with extinction resulting from human persecution, habitat encroachment, and the loss of habitat connectivity.

Objective

To identify areas that favor landscape connectivity for three large carnivores within and between northwestern Mexico and southwestern United States.

Methods

We performed a habitat suitability analysis for puma (Puma concolor), Mexican wolf (Canis lupus baileyi), and black bear (Ursus americanus) by combining ecological niche modeling with anthropogenic variables to identify high-quality habitat patches to be connected. We also developed a connectivity analysis to identify smaller suitable habitat patches within connecting corridors to evaluate their contributions to connecting larger populations.

Results

We found existing large, high-quality areas in Mexico and the United States that could connect through smaller patches. Likewise, we identified pinch-point areas, patches and links with high centrality, indicating that some biological corridors promote connectivity among the most extensive suitable patches.

Conclusions

It is possible to maintain and even enhance adequate landscape connectivity between major suitable habitat patches for the three large carnivores, within and between their distributional areas in Mexico and the United States. In this regard, decision-makers, academia, and civil society need to strengthen their bonds to reduce the pressure on these carnivores and help authorities improve binational plans and agreements to consolidate conservation actions and landscape connectivity between Mexico and the United States.

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Data Availability

The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

ZGS thanks the Ph.D. Program in Sustainability Sciences of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). We thank Luis Osorio-Olvera (UNAM) and Oscar Gómez Godinez (CONABIO) for help with model implementation, Angela Cuervo-Robayo for helpful comments and suggestions, and A. Townsend Peterson for improving the manuscript and writing.

Funding

PAPIIT-UNAM (Project number IN212217), Idea Wild, and the Latin American Student Field Grant of the American Society of Mammalogists (to ZGS) provided financial support for the study. ZGS (No. 333,463/230,736) and AGB (No. 176,133/176,133) received Ph.D. scholarships from the Mexican Council of Science and Technology (CONACyT).

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  1. Departamento de Zoología, Instituto de Biología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Tercer Circuito Exterior s/n Ciudad Universitaria, 04510, Coyoacán, Mexico

    Zaira Y. González-Saucedo, Alejandro González-Bernal & Enrique Martínez-Meyer

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  1. Zaira Y. González-Saucedo
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  2. Alejandro González-Bernal
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  3. Enrique Martínez-Meyer
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All authors contributed with the idea of the analysis. ZYGS and AGB carried out the spatial and statistical analyses under the supervision of EMM. All authors contributed equally with ideas and discussion. ZYGS lead the writing and EMM the editing.

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Correspondence to Enrique Martínez-Meyer.

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González-Saucedo, Z.Y., González-Bernal, A. & Martínez-Meyer, E. Identifying priority areas for landscape connectivity for three large carnivores in northwestern Mexico and southwestern United States. Landscape Ecol 36, 877–896 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-020-01185-4

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