Balancing act: Persistence of the red fox in the dog-dominated landscapes of the trans-Himalaya

Free-ranging dogs pose a growing threat to wildlife globally. In the Indian Trans-Himalaya, growing populations of dogs raise concerns about their impact on native carnivores. Red foxes in Spiti Valley share spatial and dietary niches with dogs, despite intraguild killing pressure. Sampling across a gradient of dog density, we investigated two potential mechanisms that might enable the observed sympatry between foxes and dogs. Using a cue-based foraging station experiment, we investigated the use of anti-predatory vigilance by foxes. We also used a camera trap array, to assess temporal partitioning between the two canids and the relative abundance of foxes across the dog density gradient. Foxes only increased vigilance in response to simulated dog presence at sites with high dog-densities. We found that temporal overlap was low across the dog-density gradient. Fox relative abundances increased with dog density, indicating a lack of apparent top-down effects by dogs. Our findings suggest that while temporal partitioning may reduce encounters, heightened vigilance in high-risk areas is crucial for co-existence. We highlight the complex behavioural mechanisms facilitating the persistence of a generalist mesocarnivore in the face of increasing pressure from free-ranging dogs and underscore the need for similar investigations in other human-dominated landscapes.

Methods
There are two datasets.

Dataset for diel activity. This dataset was collected through an array of 29 camera traps which were deployed around areas of dog activity. We list the species ID of detected animals, the date and time of detection, and camera identifier. This data has been processed. We excluded consequetive species detections that were within 30 minutes of each other to ensure temporal independance of our observations.
Dataset for foraging station experiment. This dataset was collected through 6 foraging stations, where red foxes were exposed to 2 stimuli simulating dog presence, and 2 control stimuli. We enumerated the proportion of time these foxes spent with their heads raised (proportion of time spent being vigilant) under each treatment.