Movement of large carnivores across human dominated landscapes
In our study areas, large carnivore species living outside PAs exhibited greater mean displacement (25.29%) than the species inside PAs with a single exception of the dhole. Dholes moved with higher speeds (i.e. with longer step lengths) among the 3 large carnivores sharing a similar habitat inside PAs. Predominantly occurring in disturbed habitats, wolves showed the highest movement amongst all 4 carnivores whereas the leopards in natural areas showed the least. Our findings are contrary to the findings of Tucker et al., (2018) that suggested mammalian movement in human dominated areas is only up to one half the extent of their movement in natural areas with relatively low human pressures. The major limitation of Tucker’s study was that it did not include species, especially large carnivores from developing countries with high human and carnivore densities, livestock and fragmented landscapes.
We also found tigers outside PAs moved at higher speeds than inside PAs. Our result on wolves and tigers outside PAs ties well with previous studies wherein cougars and lions in human dominated landscapes exhibited higher speeds while traversing through fragmented human dominated areas to reduce time spent in multiple use areas (Kertson, Spencer, Marzluff, Hepinstall-Cymerman, & Grue 2011; Valeix, Hemson, Loveridge, Mills, & Macdonald 2012).
Across sexes, both male and female tigers traveled more at night than during the day. Male tigers traveled faster than female tigers owing to larger home ranges and longer distance to cover in habitat matrix. As males exhibit multiple core areas in human altered landscapes, the movement rate to travel between core areas was high.
Leopards took the highest time (1258.50±485.59) to return from the point of maximum displacement to the point of origin. Leopards survive in the presence of large predators like tigers and pack-living dholes that make up for their size in numbers. Intense intraguild competition has driven leopards to the boundaries of the study area where they are faced with human pressures. Under such circumstances, leopards travel from one core area to other and spend more time in such core areas. This strategy enables them to co-exist with large carnivores and humans.
Interestingly, tigers outside PAs took comparatively lesser time (141.4 ± 44.77) to cover their home range than tigers inside PAs (208.4 ± 167.7) even though their home ranges (95% contour) outside PAs were larger in size. As discussed, tigers in human disturbed areas move faster owing to presence of habitat matrix between core areas. which enables them to cover larger areas in shorter time.