Pronghorn movements and mortality during extreme weather highlight the importance of landscape connectivity

This dataset accompanies the paper: Aikens, E.O., J. A. Merkle, W. Xu and H. Sawyer (2025). Escape movements during extreme weather highlight the critical importance of connectivity. Current Biology.
Paper Summary: Human disturbance and development are fragmenting landscapes, limiting the ability of organisms to freely move to meet their survival and reproductive needs. Simultaneously, extreme weather events – such as tropical cyclones, megafires, and heatwaves – pose a major threat to survival and may require animals to rapidly move to escape. As the dual forces of landscape fragmentation and extreme weather events continue to intensify, researchers urgently need to develop an understanding of the synergistic effects of these forces on animal mobility and survival. Here, we present a case study on pronghorn (Antilocapra americana) that undertook extraordinary long-distance movements (up to 399 km) to escape a once-in-two-decade extreme snowstorm in the Red Desert, WY, USA. Although Wyoming is a seemingly underdeveloped landscape, high fence density and two major highways in the region exposed pronghorn to novel barriers that delayed movement, restricted habitat access, and ultimately hindered their ability to escape extreme snow accumulation. The synergistic effects of movement barriers and extreme weather increased mortality rates by 3.7-fold such that over 50% of GPS-monitored pronghorn perished. These findings highlight the critical need to study escape movements and prioritize connectivity planning to curtail mass mortality events and ensure population persistence.

本数据集配套以下论文：Aikens, E.O.、J. A. Merkle、W. Xu 与 H. Sawyer (2025) 发表于《当代生物学（Current Biology）》的《极端天气期间的逃生运动凸显连通性的关键重要性》。
论文摘要：人类活动干扰与开发正在持续破碎化自然景观，限制了生物自由移动以满足生存与繁殖需求的能力。与此同时，热带气旋、巨型山火、热浪等极端天气事件对生物生存构成重大威胁，可能迫使动物快速移动以完成逃生。随着景观破碎化与极端天气事件这双重压力持续加剧，研究者亟需厘清二者对动物移动能力与生存状况的协同效应。本研究以美国怀俄明州红沙漠地区的叉角羚（Antilocapra americana）为案例对象，记录了它们为躲避一场二十年一遇的极端暴雪而进行的超长距离移动（最远可达399千米）。尽管怀俄明州看似开发程度较低，但该区域高密度的围栏与两条主要高速公路给叉角羚带来了全新的移动障碍：这些障碍延缓了它们的移动进程、限制了栖息地可达性，并最终阻碍了它们躲避极端积雪堆积的逃生能力。移动障碍与极端天气的协同效应使叉角羚的死亡率提升了3.7倍，在通过GPS追踪的监测个体中，超过50%最终死亡。本研究结果凸显了开展逃生运动相关研究、优先推进连通性规划的迫切性，以遏制大规模死亡事件的发生，保障种群存续。