Tolhurst Bryony A, Baker Rowenna J, Cagnacci Francesca, Scott Dawn M
Ecology, Conservation and Zoonosis (ECZ) Research and Enterprise Group, Huxley Building, University of Brighton, Brighton BN2 4GJ, UK.
Research and Innovation Centre, Fondazione Edmund Mach, Via Mach 1, San Michele all'Adige, 38010 Trentino, Italy.
Animals (Basel). 2020 Jul 9;10(7):1167. doi: 10.3390/ani10071167.
Red foxes are a well-established species of urban ecosystems in the UK and worldwide. Understanding the spatial ecology of foxes in urban landscapes is important for enhancement of urban biodiversity and effective disease management. The Resource Dispersion Hypothesis (RDH) holds that territory (home range) size is linked to distribution and richness of habitat patches such that aggregation of rich resources should be negatively associated with range size. Here, we tested the RDH on a sample of 20 red foxes ( in the city of Brighton and Hove. We focused on residential garden areas, as foxes were associated with these in previous studies. We equipped 12 male and 8 female foxes with GPS collars recording at 15 min intervals during discrete seasons over four years. We regressed fox core area size against garden size, number of garden patches, and edge density within and between patches as extracted from GIS in a series of bivariate linear mixed models. We found that foxes used smaller core areas where gardens were large and well-connected and larger core areas where numerous, smaller gardens were fragmented by internal barriers (e.g., fences, walls) or bisected by other habitats such as managed grassland or built-up areas. Our findings confirm the RDH and help to inform future urban planning for wildlife.
赤狐是英国乃至全球城市生态系统中已稳固存在的物种。了解城市景观中狐狸的空间生态学对于增强城市生物多样性和有效进行疾病管理至关重要。资源分散假说（RDH）认为，领地（家域）大小与栖息地斑块的分布和丰富度相关，因此丰富资源的聚集应与活动范围大小呈负相关。在此，我们在布莱顿和霍夫市对20只赤狐样本进行了资源分散假说测试。我们聚焦于住宅花园区域，因为在先前研究中狐狸与这些区域有关联。我们给12只雄性和8只雌性狐狸佩戴了GPS项圈，在四年中的不同季节以15分钟的间隔进行记录。在一系列双变量线性混合模型中，我们将狐狸核心区域大小与从地理信息系统（GIS）中提取的花园大小、花园斑块数量以及斑块内部和斑块之间的边缘密度进行了回归分析。我们发现，在花园面积大且连接良好的地方，狐狸使用的核心区域较小；而在众多较小的花园被内部障碍物（如围栏、墙壁）分割或被其他栖息地（如人工草地或建成区）一分为二的地方，狐狸使用的核心区域较大。我们的研究结果证实了资源分散假说，并有助于为未来的城市野生动物规划提供参考。
