Data from: Rate of inter-sex interactions affects injury likelihood in Tasmanian devil contact networks

Identifying the types of contacts that result in disease transmission is
important for accurately modelling and predicting transmission dynamics
and disease spread in wild populations. We investigated contacts within a
population of adult Tasmanian devils (Sarcophilus harrisii) over a
six-month period and tested whether individual-level contact patterns were
correlated with accumulation of bite wounds. Bite wounds are important in
the spread of devil facial tumour disease (DFTD), a clonal cancer cell
line transmitted through direct inoculation of tumour cells when
susceptible and infected individuals bite each other. We used multi-model
inference and network autocorrelation models to investigate the effects of
individual-level contact patterns, identities of interacting partners, and
position within the social network on the propensity to be involved in
bite-inducing contacts. We found that males were more likely to receive
potentially disease-transmitting bite wounds than females, particularly
during the mating season when males spend extended periods mate-guarding
females. The number of bite wounds individuals received during the mating
season was unrelated to any of the network metrics examined. Our approach
illustrates the necessity for understanding which contact types spread
disease in different systems to assist the management of this and other
infectious wildlife diseases.