Benefit or ecological trap? Monitoring the effects of small clear-cuts on capercaillie Tetrao urogallus and its mammalian predators

The shift to “close to nature forestry” as the dominating forestry regime in Western-European forests has resulted in increasing timber volume and denser forests with negative effects on photophilic species. Hence, there is an increasing focus on active habitat management measures to support these species. To guarantee that the measures prove beneficial to the target species, it is essential to evaluate both their benefits as well as possible negative effects. However, while species’ population trends are often well-studied, rigorous monitoring schemes for management interventions are often lacking.
Here we applied a before-after-control-intervention (BACI) study design over multiple years to study the effects of actively creating small clear-cuts of up to 1 hectare on the occurrence of western capercaillie (Tetrao urogallus) and its mammalian predators. While habitat management measures had immediate positive effects on the probability of capercaillie presence that remained constant du..., , # Data from: Benefit or ecological trap? Monitoring the effects of small clear-cuts on capercaillie Tetrao urogallus and its mammalian predators

Dataset DOI: [10.5061/dryad.k0p2ngfjw](10.5061/dryad.k0p2ngfjw)

## Description of the data and file structure

Data was collected to study the effects of actively creating small clear-cuts of up to 1 ha on the occurrence of western capercaillie (*Tetrao urogallus*) and its mammalian predators.

We collected data on capercaillie occurrence and habitat suitability on 30 paired study sites (15 pairs), distributed across the Black Forest. For each pair, a small clear-cut of 0.7–1.0 ha was experimentally created in the centre of one study site (intervention, I), while the other served as control (control, C). On each study site we systematically placed 13 sampling plots on which the terrestrial recording of capercaillie occurrence and habitat variables was carried out once per year from 2018 to 2023.

Furthermore, on each study site we monitored p...,