Habitat attributes associated with short-term settlement of Ozark hellbender (Cryptobranchus alleganiensis bishopi) salamanders following translocation to the wild

1. Organisms associated with lotic systems rank among the most threatened because of global change. Although translocation is being increasingly applied as a conservation strategy, most studies have focused on survival and recruitment of individuals, and few have attempted to identify how habitat attributes influence short-term settlement of animals during the critical post-release period. 2. We demonstrate the application of resource selection modelling in an information theoretic framework to identify release-site characteristics that will increase the likelihood of settlement for a fully aquatic benthic stream salamander, the Ozark hellbender (Cryptobranchus alleganiensis bishopi). We fit discrete choice models using data from 29 radio-tagged hellbenders that were translocated to two sites in the North Fork of the White River (NFWR), Missouri (U.S.A.). We defined resource availability at two spatial scales (stream reach and home range) and quantified abiotic habitat attributes at 31...

1. 受全球变化影响，与流水生态系统（lotic system）相关的生物是受威胁程度最高的类群之一。尽管易地保护（translocation）作为一种保护策略的应用日益广泛，但绝大多数相关研究仅聚焦于个体的存活与补充，极少有研究试图阐明在放归后的关键窗口期内，栖息地属性如何影响动物的短期定居行为。2. 本研究展示了如何在信息论框架下应用资源选择模型，以确定能够提升完全水生底栖溪流蝾螈——奥泽尔隐鳃鲵（Ozark hellbender，Cryptobranchus alleganiensis bishopi）——定居概率的放归位点特征。我们利用29只被无线电标记的奥泽尔隐鳃鲵的追踪数据构建离散选择模型，这些个体被迁地放归至美国密苏里州怀特河北支（North Fork of the White River, NFWR）的两个研究位点。我们在两个空间尺度（河段与家域）下定义了资源可获得性，并对31处……的非生物栖息地属性进行了量化。