Social and seasonal variation in dwarf mongoose home-range size, daily movements and burrow use

When making decisions about resource use, social species must integrate not only environmental factors but also the influence of opportunities and costs associated with group living. Bigger groups are expected to move further and to need access to larger areas for adequate food acquisition, but the relationships with group size can vary seasonally and with the reproductive stage. Shelters are often more consistent in availability than food, but their use relates to factors such as predator defense and parasite transmission that are themselves influenced by group size and seasonality. Here, we used long-term data to investigate resource use and associated movement in a wild population of dwarf mongooses (Helogale parvula). We found that bigger groups occupied larger home ranges, moved larger daily distances, and covered more daily areas than smaller ones, whilst environmental greenness (measured by normalised difference vegetation index [NDVI]) influenced daily movements in the breeding ..., , , # Data from: Social and seasonal variation in dwarf mongoose home-range size, daily movements and burrow use

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.fbg79cp4z](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.fbg79cp4z)

## Description of the data and file structure

All methods regarding data collection and processing can be found in the methods section of the manuscript:

Arbon JJ, Morris-Drake A, Kern JM, Giuggioli L, Radford AN. 2024. Social and seasonal variation in dwarf mongoose home-range size, daily movements, and burrow use. Behavioural Ecology.

This entry contains all the data required to replicate the analyses presented in the main text of the paper.

### Files and variables

#### File: DataCodeFinal.zip

**Description:** 

**File: homerangeEstimates**

* Data for home-range size analysis. Columns are:

- Group: Unique two-letter group code

* Season: Year*Season (e.g. Breeding_2021 is breeding season that spans years 2020 and 2021)

- Season_type: Breeding/Non-Breeding

* NDVI: NDVI value for that h...