Open AccessSmall mammal sampling incidents related to wild boar (Sus scrofa) in natural peri–urban areas
Author(s) -
Ignasi Torre,
Seán Cahill,
Joan Grajera,
Alfons Raspall,
Alfons Raspall,
Marc Vilella
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
animal biodiversity and conservation
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.39
H-Index - 34
eISSN - 2014-928X
pISSN - 1578-665X
DOI - 10.32800/abc.2022.45.0033
Subject(s) - wild boar , mammal , biology , population density , domestic pig , ecology , population , geography , zoology , environmental health , forestry , medicine
The wild boar (Sus scrofa) has recently shown continuous population increases in many countries, leading to a rise in conflicts with human activities, including habituation to people and urban areas. Wild boar can disrupt the sampling of small mammals by reducing the number of potential captures. In this study we analysed whether sampling incidents recorded within a small mammal monitoring programme (SEMICE, www.semice.org) might be related to the density of wild boar in a network of protected parks. Our results suggested a peri–urban effect that was independent of wild boar densities in the protected parks; the number of damaged traps increased (rendering them inoperable for captures) and potentially resulted in underestimates of small mammals due to fewer functioning traps in the study area. We hypothesised that this high rate of damage to traps in a small and localised area in a peri–urban park could be related to wild boar associating human presence with greater opportunities to obtain food items of anthropogenic origin.