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Nature-based tourist destinations attract millions of visitors every year. In 2020, this trend was interrupted by the emergence of the COVID-19 disease and the introduction of global travel restrictions, which significantly reduced the number of tourists. However, with the lifting of these restrictions, the number of visitors to natural areas is increasing even faster. Many of these destinations are national parks and are poorly prepared for rapidly growing attendance, making the impact of human presence on wildlife in protected areas a concern. The main impacts of nature-based tourism on protected areas are: negative impacts on wildlife behaviour by increasing stress levels and spreading diseases and invasive species. There is a risk that nature-based tourism will cause even more damage to nature in the near future, as tourists’ knowledge of ecology and nature conservation is still insufficient, visitor numbers are increasing dynamically and the adaptation and management of protected areas is still inadequate. The most urgent research directions related to nature-based tourism are: large carnivores, ungulates, birds, amphibians and reptiles. Solutions for the management of protected areas should include: e.g. the establishment of educational centres, the provision of additional attractions, the temporary exclusion of certain parts of national parks and the reconstruction of tourism infrastructure in protected areas.

Although many medium-to-large terrestrial vertebrates are still counted by ground or aerial surveys, remote-sensing technologies and image analysis have developed rapidly in recent decades, offering improved accuracy and repeatability, lower costs, speed, expanded spatial coverage and increased potential for public involvement. This review provides an introduction for wildlife biologists and managers relatively new to the field on how to implement remote-sensing techniques (satellite and unoccupied aircraft systems) for counting large vertebrates on land, including marine predators that return to land to breed, haul out or roost, to encourage wider application of these technological solutions. We outline the entire process, including the selection of the most appropriate technology, indicative costs, procedures for image acquisition and processing, observer training and annotation, automation, and citizen science campaigns. The review considers both the potential and the challenges associated with different approaches to remote surveys of vertebrates and outlines promising avenues for future research and method development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nature-based tourist destinations attract millions of visitors every year. In 2020, this trend was interrupted by the emergence of the COVID-19 disease and the introduction of global travel restrictions, which significantly reduced the number of tourists. However, with the lifting of these restrictions, the number of visitors to natural areas is increasing even faster. Many of these destinations are national parks and are poorly prepared for rapidly growing attendance, making the impact of human presence on wildlife in protected areas a concern. The main impacts of nature-based tourism on protected areas are: negative impacts on wildlife behaviour by increasing stress levels and spreading diseases and invasive species. There is a risk that nature-based tourism will cause even more damage to nature in the near future, as tourists' knowledge of ecology and nature conservation is still insufficient, visitor numbers are increasing dynamically and the adaptation and management of protected areas is still inadequate. The most urgent research directions related to nature-based tourism are: large carnivores, ungulates, birds, amphibians and reptiles. Solutions for the management of protected areas should include: e.g. the establishment of educational centres, the provision of additional attractions, the temporary exclusion of certain parts of national parks and the reconstruction of tourism infrastructure in protected areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historically, reproductive health in wildlife species has been evaluated primarily via immunoassay detection of fecal and urinary steroid hormone metabolites. This combination of sample type, biomarker category, and assay has been preferred for decades due to the ease of assessing reproductive health through the evaluation of stable compounds in easily collected biological samples using a cost-effective method. Increasingly, beginning with high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and more recently with convergence chromatography and ultra HPLC coupled with mass spectrometry (MS), wildlife studies are incorporating more sensitive and specific high-throughput technologies for the assessment of not only steroid hormone metabolites but proteins as well. Of note, a comprehensive health evaluation requires the measurement of biological readouts that modulate reproduction such as: glucocorticoids, leptin, insulin, thyroid hormones, melatonin, the microbiome, and markers of inflammation. Emerging modulatory biomarkers of reproductive health include acute phase proteins, microRNAs, and reactive oxygen species. Several of these biomarkers require application of newer technologies such as LC-MS/MS and sequencing, which demonstrates the need for the field of wildlife reproductive biology to diversify from its reliance on immunoassays. Importantly, endocrine disrupting chemicals adversely affect many aspects of reproductive function and evaluation of these compounds requires high throughput technology such as LC-MS/MS. The application of sequencing, particularly Next Generation Sequencing of bulk RNA (RNA-Seq) and single cell RNA-Seq, is uncommon in studies of wildlife reproductive health. However, as the cost of these methods decreases and consortiums of wildlife researchers band together to raise funds in support of studies using these technologies, their use will become more routine. Future research should focus on integration of known biomarkers of related systems into comprehensive reproductive assessments and the development of new biomarkers which are sensitive, precise, and employ non-invasive methodologies for the assessment of reproductive health of wildlife species.

This paper examines the arguments used to claim that we should use nonhuman animals in research, rather than methods that do not involve animals, while we should reject human experimentation. The paper argues that the appeal to an axiological or a normative gap between the weight of the interests of humans and nonhuman animals has several unacceptable implications. It then points at a battery of problematic consequences that other anthropocentric positions have. Finally, the paper argues that even if anthropocentrism is correct, the aggregate weight of animals' interests may prevail over that of human interest in using them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For wildlife inhabiting snowy environments, snow properties such as onset date, depth, strength, and distribution can influence many aspects of ecology, including movement, community dynamics, energy expenditure, and forage accessibility. As a result, snow plays a considerable role in individual fitness and ultimately population dynamics, and its evaluation is, therefore, important for comprehensive understanding of ecosystem processes in regions experiencing snow. Such understanding, and particularly study of how wildlife–snow relationships may be changing, grows more urgent as winter processes become less predictable and often more extreme under global climate change. However, studying and monitoring wildlife–snow relationships continue to be challenging because characterizing snow, an inherently complex and constantly changing environmental feature, and identifying, accessing, and applying relevant snow information at appropriate spatial and temporal scales, often require a detailed understanding of physical snow science and technologies that typically lie outside the expertise of wildlife researchers and managers. We argue that thoroughly assessing the role of snow in wildlife ecology requires substantive collaboration between researchers with expertise in each of these two fields, leveraging the discipline‐specific knowledge brought by both wildlife and snow professionals. To facilitate this collaboration and encourage more effective exploration of wildlife–snow questions, we provide a five‐step protocol: (1) identify relevant snow property information; (2) specify spatial, temporal, and informational requirements; (3) build the necessary datasets; (4) implement quality control procedures; and (5) incorporate snow information into wildlife analyses. Additionally, we explore the types of snow information that can be used within this collaborative framework. We illustrate, in the context of two examples, field observations, remote‐sensing datasets, and four example modeling tools that simulate spatiotemporal snow property distributions and, in some cases, evolutions. For each type of snow data, we highlight the collaborative opportunities for wildlife and snow professionals when designing snow data collection efforts, processing snow remote sensing products, producing tailored snow datasets, and applying the resulting snow information in wildlife analyses. We seek to provide a clear path for wildlife professionals to address wildlife–snow questions and improve ecological inference by integrating the best available snow science through collaboration with snow professionals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Elucidating factors that contribute to citation rates of scientific articles can help scientists write manuscripts that have a stronger influence on their scientific field and are accessible to a broad audience. Using a cohort of 778 articles published in The Journal of Wildlife Management from 2011–2015, we examined how visibility strategies, article structure, and focal system (all factors authors can predominantly control) influenced the accumulation of citations over various time frames within the first 5 years after publication, and the number of days until an article received its first citation. Visibility strategies (e.g., open access, increasing the Altmetric Attention Score, and self‐citations) all influenced the number of citations accrued following publication. Citations were more stochastic 1 year following publication compared to 5 years following publication, with only 20.1% of papers receiving a citation after 1 year compared to 92.5% of papers receiving a citation after 5 years. Our model explained much more of the variation after 5 years compared to after only 1 year (R2 = 0.57 and 0.12, respectively). The number of factors significantly associated with citation rates increased as the timeframe of our analysis increased. After 5 years, factors associated with article structure (e.g., number of references), focal system (e.g., methods papers), and visibility all increased citation counts of papers. Our work suggests citation rates within wildlife ecology are influenced by a number of controllable factors, and that authors pursuing a variety of visibility strategies can increase the influence of an article on science and management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The latest technologies associated with implantable physiological monitoring devices can record multiple channels of data (including: heart rates and rhythms, activity, temperature, impedance and posture), and coupled with powerful software applications, have provided novel insights into the physiology of animals in the wild. This perspective details past challenges and lessons learned from the uses and developments of implanted biologgers designed for human clinical application in our research on free-ranging American black bears (Ursus americanus). In addition, we reference other research by colleagues and collaborators who have leveraged these devices in their work, including: brown bears (Ursus arctos), grey wolves (Canis lupus), moose (Alces alces), maned wolves (Chrysocyon brachyurus) and southern elephant seals (Mirounga leonina). We also discuss the potentials for applications of such devices across a range of other species. To date, the devices described have been used in fifteen different wild species, with publications pending in many instances. We have focused our physiological research on the analyses of heart rates and rhythms and thus special attention will be paid to this topic. We then discuss some major expected step changes such as improvements in sensing algorithms, data storage, and the incorporation of next-generation short-range wireless telemetry. The latter provides new avenues for data transfer, and when combined with cloud-based computing, it not only provides means for big data storage but also the ability to readily leverage high-performance computing platforms using artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms. These advances will dramatically increase both data quantity and quality and will facilitate the development of automated recognition of extreme physiological events or key behaviours of interest in a broad array of environments, thus further aiding wildlife monitoring and management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mammals commonly use latrines to communicate with each other via behaviors, such as scent marking and defecation. Olfactory cues resulting from these behaviors may influence the behavior of other species in and around latrines. The North American river otter (Lontra canadensis) is well known for its conspicuous use of latrines. We investigated whether latrine behavior of otters affected the behavior of other mammalian species. We used remote cameras to record activity patterns, visitation rates, and species richness at nine otter latrines located at five stud)' sites across northern Indiana. We predicted the use of latrines by otters would result in the avoidance of latrines by other mammals in these riparian systems. Monthly mean species richness was lower at control sites than at latrine sites. Coyotes visited latrine sites more often than control sites, but all other species visited latrines and controls equally. Analysis of activity patterns revealed only white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginiana) changed activity from primarily nocturnal at latrines to primarily diurnal activity at control sites. Our findings suggest otter latrine activity has minimal effect on the behavior of most other mammals. Therefore, surveying otter latrines with remote cameras may simultaneously provide unbiased estimates about the diversity of the riparian mammal community given mammals tended to visit latrine and control sites equally., INTRODUCTION Many wildlife species establish latrine sites for communication (Johnson, 1973). Latrines are areas where members of a species consistently defecate and/or scent mark, often accompanied by a scent that [...]

ABSTRACT. We explored Inuit attitudes towards co-managing wildlife in the Kivalliq Region of Nunavut, Canada, working in partnership with the hunters and trappers' organizations of Igluligaarjuk (Chesterfield Inlet), Tikirarjuaq (Whale [...]

Although biodiversity conservation is a prioritized topic globally, agreements and regulations at multiple levels often fail to meet the desired effects due to insufficient knowledge transmission about and tolerance toward environmental protection measures among the public. To find effective measures to solve human–wildlife conflicts (HWCs) and promote a sustainable coexistence, it is essential to gain the public's understanding of the importance of preserving biodiversity. To spur progress in solution‐oriented conservation science, we examine how citizen science (CS) can complement research in the HWC field and coexistence/mitigation strategies. We find that CS (1) is an effective tool for gathering wildlife data and (2) empowers citizens to participate in or drive (in a bottom‐up manner) wildlife research and management. Each HWC has a unique social, economic, and geographical context, which makes it challenging to find appropriate mitigation measures. We developed a Global and Local Geographic (GLG) model that provides practical guidelines for implementing CS in HWC research. We argue that the inclusion of youth is fundamental to achieving coexistence between people and wildlife; thus integrating CS into formal education or including an educational component in CS projects can support the sustainable conservation of wildlife species and foster environmentally aware future generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]