SECONDO database and animal tracking data: querying spatiotemporal patterns of individual space use

Key results: analysis and understanding of spatiotemporal patterns of individual movement allows to investigate the spatial relationships occurring between animals. A deep investigation of this topic is relevant both from a behavioural and wildlife management perspective: identification of contact points between animals allows to build predictive models on disease transmission patterns, that constitute an important contribution for wildlife management. The networking between the group of Animal Ecology from Fondazione Edmund Mach (Italy) and the group of Professor Güting at FernUniversity in Hagen (Germany) permitted to investigate the spatiotemporal patterns of movements of roe deer (Capreolus capreolus) by applying SECONDO database to animal relocation data collected in the database of the collaborative project Eurodeer (www.eurodeer.org). After a technical assessment of SECONDO performances on the handling and management of roe deer positional data, we used this spatiotemporal database to investigate the effect of artificial feeding sites (i.e. those sites where food is provided by wildlife managers during winter time) on roe deer spatial relationships and use of space. We found that feeding site management strongly affects the movement of individuals, that tend to gather towards these punctual resources when food is provided, while do not bias their movements towards feeding sites out of management period