Revilla Sánchez, Eloy2025-03-312025-03-312024-12-20Morales González, A. (2024). Demography and population Dynamics of the grey Wolf in human-dominated Landscapes. (Tesis Doctoral Inédita). Universidad de Sevilla, Sevilla.https://hdl.handle.net/11441/171186Human domination of earth ecosystems is causing biodiversity changes such as distribution shifts and variation in population abundances at unprecedented levels in historical times. These changes result from the interplay of local population processes of reproduction and mortality with dispersal of individuals that can connect local populations, and the dependence of these processes on the environment. Thus, understanding the demography of wildlife populations is a prerequisite to predict population dynamics under different scenarios. This is urgent for large carnivores, which are one of the most vulnerable groups to human activities due to their slow life-histories and large spatial requirements. However, unrevealing the demography of group-living large carnivores entails great complexity because the demographic processes of reproduction, survival and dispersal are influenced by group level factors such as social status and group size. This is the case of the grey wolf (Canis lupus), a large social canid widely distributed across the northern hemisphere. Although much research exists on this species in different local areas, the patterns and determinants of demographic processes remain little understood at the species level. Similarly, it is unknown how these processes interact to determine population dynamics. The main aim of the present thesis is to identify the patterns and determinants of dispersal and mortality in grey wolves at the species level, as well as to identify how the demographic processes of reproduction, mortality and dispersal interact to determine population range dynamics. To achieve the former, I did two literature reviews on dispersal and mortality processes, respectively. Then, to identify how demographic processes interact to determine population range dynamics, I developed a spatially-explicit individual based model (SE-IBM) for wolves in the Iberian Peninsula, using detailed ecological and demographic data gathered in the previous reviews and in available literature on reproduction. I particularly focused on simulating the complexity of the species social-group dynamics and dispersal processes. I found that information on wolf dispersal and mortality is spatially biased towards Europe and North America, with information lacking for large and relatively low human-modified areas within the distribution range such as the arctic region or the deserts. I detected a great variability in both processes, which is probably explained by the multiple contexts in which wolves live (e.g., in terms of landscapes and protection status). I found that many determinants (e.g., breeding status, population density, diseases and direct persecution) shape dispersal and mortality. However, the influence of human activities may outpace the influence of environmental natural factors, as evidenced by the high annual rates of mortality (0.34 ± 0.24) and the high proportion of deaths by human causes (0.74 ± 0.22). Studies on dispersal and mortality presented important methodological limitations, such as low detection of poaching events that can bias parameter estimates. On the other hand, my IBM revealed that high mortality rates in residents disrupt social groups, leading to decreased reproductive success and more vacant territories. Such disruptions promote short dispersal and ultimately limit range expansion. The combination of the two literature reviews revealing the patterns of wolf demographic processes, and the model showing how these demographic processes interact to shape range dynamics allowed for an integrative study that successfully captured the intricacies of demography in a large social carnivore. My results suggest that wolves perceive multiple demographic costs derived from living alongside humans and contribute significantly to our understanding of wolf demography under scenarios with different human pressures.application/pdf241 p.engAttribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 Internationalhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/info:eu-repo/semantics/doctoralThesisinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess