Capture-recapture and reproduction data of wolves across Central Europe

This dataset and R script was used to analyze apparent survival and reproductive output of mated territorial wolves across six Central European countries (Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Germany, and The Netherlands). The data consists of resident wolves that had formed pairs in territories that were annually monitored for presence with a monitoring year running from 1 May to 30 April. We restricted the analysis to genetically-known individuals that had formed pairs.
We analyzed apparent annual survival (ɸ) and detection probability (p) with a Cormack-Jolly-Seber model (an open-population capture-mark-recapture model) using the R package ‘Rmark’ in R 4.4.3, based on the 'wolfdata_clean.rds' data and the R scripts 'wolf_analysisRMark_clean.r' and 'candidate_models_clean.r'. Moreover, we analyzed (1) the probability of breeding (pups observed: logit-link function, binomial errors), (2) minimum number of pups confirmed per potential breeding season (log-link-function, Poisson distributed errors; i.e. including territory years where no reproduction was recorded) and (3) minimum litter size of successful breeding attempts (number of pups registered: log-link-function, Poisson distributed errors), using generalized linear mixed effects models with territory as random effect and adjustment for overdispersion (based on the 'reproduction_data' sheet in the 'WOLF_DATA_CENTRAL_EUROPE.xlsx' file). For details, please see the manuscript 'Density dependence and human impact regulate survival and reproduction in Central European wolves' by Sunde et al.