University of Wisconsin - Madison, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, Madison, WI, 53706, USA; Northland College, Department of Natural Resources, Ashland, WI, 54806, USA.
University of Wisconsin - Madison, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, Madison, WI, 53706, USA; University of Wisconsin - Madison, Department of Forest & Wildlife Ecology, Madison, WI, 53706, USA.
J Environ Manage. 2019 Oct 15;248:109307. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2019.109307. Epub 2019 Aug 10.
Managing risk requires an adequate understanding of risk-factors that influence the likelihood of a particular event occurring in time and space. Risk maps can be valuable tools for natural resource managers, allowing them to better understand spatial characteristics of risk. Risk maps can also support risk-avoidance efforts by identifying which areas are relatively riskier than others. However, risks, such as human-carnivore conflict, can be diverse, multi-faceted, and overlapping in space. Yet, efforts to describe risk typically focus on only one aspect of risk. We examined wolf complaints investigated in Wisconsin, USA for the period of 1999-2011. We described the spatial patterns of four types of wolf-human conflict: livestock depredation, depredation on hunting hounds, depredation on non-hound dogs, and human health and safety concerns (HHSC). Using predictive landscape models and discriminant functions analysis, we visualized the landscape of risk as a continuous surface of overlapping risks. Each type of conflict had its own unique landscape signature; however, the probability of any type of conflict increased closer to the center of wolf pack territories and with increased forest cover. Hunting hound depredations tended to occur in areas considered to be highly suitable wolf habitat, while livestock depredations occurred more regularly in marginal wolf habitat. HHSC and non-hound dog depredations were less predictable spatially but tended to occur in areas with low housing density adjacent to large wildland areas. Similar to other research evaluating the risk of human-carnivore conflict, our data suggests that human-carnivore conflict is most likely to occur where humans or human property and large carnivores co-occur. However, identifying areas of co-occurrence is only marginally valuable from a conservation standpoint and could be described using spatially-explicit human and carnivore data without complex analytical approaches. These results challenge our traditional understanding of risk and the standard approach used in describing risk. We suggest that a more comprehensive understanding of the risk of human-carnivore conflict can be achieved by examining the spatial and non-spatial factors influencing risk within areas of co-occurrence and by describing the landscape of risk as a continuous surface of multiple overlapping risks.
管理风险需要充分了解影响特定事件在时间和空间发生可能性的风险因素。风险图可以成为自然资源管理者的有用工具，使他们能够更好地了解风险的空间特征。风险图还可以通过确定哪些区域比其他区域更具风险来支持风险规避工作。然而，风险，如人与食肉动物的冲突，可能是多种多样的、多方面的和空间上重叠的。然而，描述风险的努力通常只关注风险的一个方面。我们检查了 1999-2011 年期间在美国威斯康星州调查的狼投诉。我们描述了四种类型的狼与人冲突的空间模式：牲畜捕食、猎犬捕食、非猎犬捕食和人类健康和安全关注（HHSC）。使用预测景观模型和判别函数分析，我们将风险景观可视化为人为重叠风险的连续表面。每种冲突类型都有其独特的景观特征；然而，任何类型的冲突的概率都随着狼种群领地中心的接近和森林覆盖的增加而增加。猎犬捕食往往发生在被认为是高度适宜狼栖息地的地区，而牲畜捕食则更经常发生在边缘狼栖息地。HHSC 和非猎犬捕食在空间上较难预测，但往往发生在与大面积野生地区相邻的住房密度较低的地区。与其他评估人与食肉动物冲突风险的研究类似，我们的数据表明，人类与食肉动物的冲突最有可能发生在人类或人类财产和大型食肉动物共存的地方。然而，从保护的角度来看，识别共存区域的价值仅略有价值，并且可以使用空间明确的人类和食肉动物数据来描述，而无需复杂的分析方法。这些结果挑战了我们对风险的传统理解和描述风险的标准方法。我们建议，通过检查影响共存区域内风险的空间和非空间因素，并将风险景观描述为多个重叠风险的连续表面，可以更全面地了解人与食肉动物冲突的风险。
