Dataset Information

Tracking animal movements using biomarkers in tail hairs: a novel approach for animal geolocating from sulfur isoscapes.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Current animal tracking studies are most often based on the application of external geolocators such as GPS and radio transmitters. While these technologies provide detailed movement data, they are costly to acquire and maintain, which often restricts sample sizes. Furthermore, deploying external geolocators requires physically capturing and recapturing of animals, which poses an additional welfare concern. Natural biomarkers provide an alternative, non-invasive approach for addressing a range of geolocation questions and can, because of relatively low cost, be collected from many individuals thereby broadening the scope for population-wide inference.

Methods

We developed a low-cost, minimally invasive method for distinguishing between local versus non-local movements of cattle using sulfur isotope ratios (?³⁴S) in cattle tail hair collected in the Greater Serengeti Ecosystem, Tanzania.

Results

We used a Generalized Additive Model to generate a predicted ?³⁴S isoscape across the study area. This isoscape was constructed using spatial smoothers and underpinned by the positive relationship between ?³⁴S values and lithology. We then established a strong relationship between ?³⁴S from recent sections of cattle tail hair and the ?³⁴S from grasses sampled in the immediate vicinity of an individual's location, suggesting ?³⁴S in the hair reflects the ?³⁴S in the environment. By combining uncertainty in estimation of the isoscape, with predictions of tail hair ?³⁴S given an animal's position in the isoscape we estimated the anisotropic distribution of travel distances across the Serengeti ecosystem sufficient to detect movement using sulfur stable isotopes.

Conclusions

While the focus of our study was on cattle, this approach can be modified to understand movements in other mobile organisms where the sulfur isoscape is sufficiently heterogeneous relative to the spatial scale of animal movements and where tracking with traditional methods is difficult.

SUBMITTER: Kabalika Z

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7501629 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Tracking animal movements using biomarkers in tail hairs: a novel approach for animal geolocating from sulfur isoscapes.

Kabalika Zabibu Z Morrison Thomas A TA McGill Rona A R RAR Munishi Linus K LK Ekwem Divine D Mahene Wilson Leonidas WL Lobora Alex L AL Newton Jason J Morales Juan M JM Haydon Daniel T DT Hopcraft Grant G J C GGJC

Movement ecology 20200918

<h4>Background</h4>Current animal tracking studies are most often based on the application of external geolocators such as GPS and radio transmitters. While these technologies provide detailed movement data, they are costly to acquire and maintain, which often restricts sample sizes. Furthermore, deploying external geolocators requires physically capturing and recapturing of animals, which poses an additional welfare concern. Natural biomarkers provide an alternative, non-invasive approach for a ...[more]

PMID: 32968486

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Project description:BackgroundSeveral felids are endangered and threatened by the illegal wildlife trade. Establishing geographic origin of tissues of endangered species is thus crucial for wildlife crime investigations and effective conservation strategies. As shown in other species, stable isotope analysis of hydrogen and oxygen in hair (?D(h), ?(18)O(h)) can be used as a tool for provenance determination. However, reliably predicting the spatial distribution of ?D(h) and ?(18)O(h) requires confirmation from animal tissues of known origin and a detailed understanding of the isotopic routing of dietary nutrients into felid hair.Methodology/findingsWe used coupled ?D(h) and ?(18)O(h) measurements from the North American bobcat (Lynx rufus) and puma (Puma concolor) with precipitation-based assignment isoscapes to test the feasibility of isotopic geo-location of felidae. Hairs of felid and rabbit museum specimens from 75 sites across the United States and Canada were analyzed. Bobcat and puma lacked a significant correlation between H/O isotopes in hair and local waters, and also exhibited an isotopic decoupling of ?(18)O(h) and ?D(h). Conversely, strong ?D and ?(18)O coupling was found for key prey, eastern cottontail rabbit (Sylvilagus floridanus; hair) and white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus; collagen, bone phosphate).Conclusions/significancePuma and bobcat hairs do not adhere to expected pattern of H and O isotopic variation predicted by precipitation isoscapes for North America. Thus, using bulk hair, felids cannot be placed on ?(18)O and ?D isoscapes for use in forensic investigations. The effective application of isotopes to trace the provenance of feline carnivores is likely compromised by major controls of their diet, physiology and metabolism on hair ?(18)O and ?D related to body water budgets. Controlled feeding experiments, combined with single amino acid isotope analysis of diets and hair, are needed to reveal mechanisms and physiological traits explaining why felid hair does not follow isotopic patterns demonstrated in many other taxa.

Project description:The stable hydrogen (delta(2)H) and oxygen (delta(18)O) isotope ratios of organic and inorganic materials record biological and physical processes through the effects of substrate isotopic composition and fractionations that occur as reactions proceed. At large scales, these processes can exhibit spatial predictability because of the effects of coherent climatic patterns over the Earth's surface. Attempts to model spatial variation in the stable isotope ratios of water have been made for decades. Leaf water has a particular importance for some applications, including plant organic materials that record spatial and temporal climate variability and that may be a source of food for migrating animals. It is also an important source of the variability in the isotopic composition of atmospheric gases. Although efforts to model global-scale leaf water isotope ratio spatial variation have been made (especially of delta(18)O), significant uncertainty remains in models and their execution across spatial domains. We introduce here a Geographic Information System (GIS) approach to the generation of global, spatially-explicit isotope landscapes (= isoscapes) of "climate normal" leaf water isotope ratios. We evaluate the approach and the resulting products by comparison with simulation model outputs and point measurements, where obtainable, over the Earth's surface. The isoscapes were generated using biophysical models of isotope fractionation and spatially continuous precipitation isotope and climate layers as input model drivers. Leaf water delta(18)O isoscapes produced here generally agreed with latitudinal averages from GCM/biophysical model products, as well as mean values from point measurements. These results show global-scale spatial coherence in leaf water isotope ratios, similar to that observed for precipitation and validate the GIS approach to modeling leaf water isotopes. These results demonstrate that relatively simple models of leaf water enrichment combined with spatially continuous precipitation isotope ratio and climate data layers yield accurate global leaf water estimates applicable to important questions in ecology and atmospheric science.

Dataset Information

Tracking animal movements using biomarkers in tail hairs: a novel approach for animal geolocating from sulfur isoscapes.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

Tracking animal movements using biomarkers in tail hairs: a novel approach for animal geolocating from sulfur isoscapes.

Similar Datasets

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