Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina Coyote recursive GPS data

Coyotes (Canis latrans) colonized the southeastern United States over the
last century as large predators, including the red wolf (Canis rufus) and
eastern cougar (Puma concolor), were extirpated from the region. As a
generalist carnivore, the coyote preys on white-tailed deer (Odocoileus
virginianus) and various smaller mammals, birds, and vegetation. While
resource selection by coyotes has been well documented at the home-range
scale, little is known about their foraging behavior, which is an
important factor in thoroughly understanding influences of coyotes on prey
and sympatric carnivores. We assessed 3rd-order resource selection of
coyotes at sites across Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina during
2015-2016. Using GPS collars, we tracked 41 resident coyotes across 4
calendar seasons and identified suspected foraging areas using recursive
analysis where individuals repeatedly returned to known locations. We
found that resident coyotes selected for open landcover types throughout
the year, while avoiding primary and secondary roads. Additionally,
resident coyotes avoided forested landcover types while selecting for
forest edges except from April to June when they foraged within interior
forest away from edges. Previous studies have documented substantive
predation rates on white-tailed deer neonates by coyotes, and that fawn
mortality may increase in forested landscapes away from forest edge. Our
findings indicate that foraging coyotes may select forest cover types
during spring where fawns are more vulnerable to predation. Additionally,
there has been debate in the literature as to how coyotes obtain
consistent levels of deer in their diets outside of fawning and fall
hunting seasons. Our study indicates that use of road-kill carcasses by
coyotes was an unlikely explanation for the presence of deer in coyote
diets throughout the year, as coyotes in our study were not observed using
roads during foraging excursions.