Good Essay On Zoo 3303: Vertebrate Zoology

Walpole, Aaron A., and Jeff Bowman. "Patch occupancy by squirrels in fragmented deciduous forest: effects of behavior." Acta Theriologica 56.1 (2011): 63-72.
Human activities have impacted the habitats of various species resulting in habitat fragmentation, which has in turn threatened the biodiversity on a comprehensive level. The decline in habitat size and elevation in habitat patches have yielded smaller and more isolated species even in adjacent habitations. The study aims to acknowledge the concept of habitat patches, patch occupancy and its association with body size among the five diverse squirrel species (Walpole and Bowman 63).
Walpole and Bowman investigated the previously proposed hypotheses regarding the area, isolation effects and group nesting behaviours of squirrels in winters. They elaborated other’s works on the patch occupancy habits of squirrels and its connection with body size. Earlier it is believed that the squirrels with large bodies are at an advanced level of extermination risks in small patches. However, they have more capabilities to settle in isolated patches. The two main characters of interest in this study are the mode of travelling and over-wintering strategy (Walpole and Bowman 64).
The study sample involves five distinct species of squirrels from Ontario, Canada to analyse the inter-species habitat behaviour. The selected species were: Tamiasciurus hudsonicus (North American red squirrel), Glaucomys sabrinus and Glaucomys volans (Northern and Southern flying squirrel), Tamias striatus (Eastern chipmunk), and Sciurus carolinensis (Eastern gray squirrel) (Walpole and Bowman 64).
This study hypothesizes that among the rodents of Sciuridae family, flying squirrels (Glaucomys sabrinus and Glaucomys volans) are highly responsive to the area effects. Furthermore, the analysis hypothesized that the distribution potential of a species in a fragmented site is impacted by their locomotive strategies that also affect their potential to rescue eradicated habitats (Walpole and Bowman 64).
The squirrels for sample purpose were picked from 30 deciduous forest patches. A Program Presence model was designed to test the hypotheses in concern of travel mode and over-wintering strategies of the squirrel. The statistical approach is adopted in data evaluation (Walpole and Bowman 65).
The results found no connection between mean body-size of squirrels and the habitat patch area. The outcomes of the study supported the first hypothesis that had predicted the maximum sensitivity of flying squirrels towards patch area. The findings are very apparent and consistent with the proposed hypothesis that the group nesting species in winters are highly responsive to the patch area. Though, the research findings did not support the hypotheses regarding the association of patch occupancy behaviours and body size (Walpole and Bowman 65-70).
The experimentation strategy of this research was very appropriate and presented squirrels as the best exemplar to understand the behavioural traits among one species that may be a foremost reason for the inconsistent behaviour to an extricated landscape.
Now the question for the researchers is which effects will be more dominating among the area, rescue and Allee effects illustrated in species populations that can protect it from extinction?