Habitat Dynamics and Resource Selection in Ungulate Populations

Ungulate populations are subject to a dynamic mosaic of habitat features that vary in space and time. Habitat dynamics refers to the continuous changes in vegetation structure, water availability and topography that influence the distribution and abundance of large herbivores such as deer, bighorn sheep, elk and antelope. Resource selection describes the process by which individual animals and populations choose among available habitat components to satisfy nutritional requirements, avoid predation and regulate thermal stress. These choices determine patterns of space use, home-range size and seasonal migrations, and underpin population resilience in the face of global change. Recent research has emphasised the importance of multi-scale analyses, examining how forage quality and cover vary at fine (10–100 m) and coarse (≥1000 m) grains. Climatic factors such as drought can force animals to trade off between access to escape terrain and areas with high moisture content, while anthropogenic barriers including highways and fragmented landscapes may restrict movement corridors. Advances in GPS tracking technology and modelling methods now allow the integration of temporal weather data, vegetative indices and terrain metrics to predict habitat suitability under future climate scenarios. This synthesis highlights the interconnected nature of habitat quality, connectivity and ungulate behavioural adaptation, emphasising applications for conservation planning, corridor design and adaptive management in diverse ecosystems.

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Habitat Dynamics and Resource Selection in Ungulate Populations publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in habitat dynamics and resource selection in ungulate populations across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Resource Selection Function (RSF): A statistical model that estimates the probability of use of habitat units based on environmental covariates.

Integrated Step Selection Function (iSSF): A modelling approach combining movement trajectories with resource selection to simulate animal paths and habitat use.

Escape Terrain: Steep or rugged areas that provide refugia from predators.

Home Range: The area traversed by an animal during its normal activities in a given time period.

Forage Covariate: An environmental variable, such as vegetation index or moisture content, used to represent food availability.

Connectivity: The degree to which landscape structure allows movement and gene flow between habitat patches.

References

1. Restoration of bighorn sheep: History, successes, and remaining conservation issues. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution (2023).
2. Movement models and simulation reveal highway impacts and mitigation opportunities for a metapopulation-distributed species. Landscape Ecology (2023).
3. Extreme drought and adaptive resource selection by a desert mammal. Ecosphere (2020).