Theses and Dissertations

Issuing Body

Mississippi State University

Advisor

Wang, Guiming

Committee Member

Jones, Jeanne C.

Committee Member

Taylor, Jimmy D.

Date of Degree

5-11-2013

Document Type

Graduate Thesis - Open Access

Major

Wildlife and Fisheries Science

Degree Name

Master of Science

College

College of Forest Resources

Department

Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Aquaculture

Abstract

I studied movement characteristics and vegetative resources effects on home range size of beavers at Redstone Arsenal (RSA) in north central Alabama, USA. Beavers were captured and radio tagged from 11 wetlands during winter and spring of 2011. I monitored movements of radio-tagged beavers using radio telemetry from May 2011–April 2012. Beavers moved faster, presumably more favorable to central place foraging, in wetland as they proceeded farther away from the central place, but did not in upland. Additionally, distributions of hourly distances from lodges were bimodal. Home range, core areas, and distance from lodge did not differ between age classes. Home range sizes increased with increasing habitat productivity and resource dispersion, whereas home ranges decreased with temporal variation in resources throughout the year. Quantity and spatial distribution of resources and patterns of foraging behavior influence movements and home ranges of central place foragers.

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11668/17657

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