Journal ArticleDOI
Behavioural responses of wildlife to urban environments
Reads0
Chats0
TLDR
It is argued that individuals that can adjust their behaviours to the new selection pressures presented by cities should have greater success in urban habitats, and members of species that are less ‘plastic’ or naturally timid in temperament are likely to be disadvantaged in high‐disturbance environments and consequently may be precluded from colonizing cities and towns.Abstract:
Increased urbanization represents a formidable challenge for wildlife. Nevertheless, a few species appear to thrive in the evolutionarily novel environment created by cities, demonstrating the remarkable adaptability of some animals. We argue that individuals that can adjust their behaviours to the new selection pressures presented by cities should have greater success in urban habitats. Accordingly, urban wildlife often exhibit behaviours that differ from those of their rural counterparts, from changes to food and den preferences to adjustments in the structure of their signals. Research suggests that behavioural flexibility (or phenotypic plasticity) may be an important characteristic for succeeding in urban environments. Moreover, some individuals or species might possess behavioural traits (a particular temperament) that are inherently well suited to occupying urban habitats, such as a high level of disturbance tolerance. This suggests that members of species that are less ‘plastic’ or naturally timid in temperament are likely to be disadvantaged in high-disturbance environments and consequently may be precluded from colonizing cities and towns.read more
Citations
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
Behavioral responses to changing environments
Bob B. M. Wong,Ulrika Candolin +1 more
TL;DR: This review considers the pivotal role that behavior plays in determining the fate of species under human-induced environmental change and discusses the importance of behavioral plasticity and whether adaptive plastic responses are sufficient in keeping pace with changing conditions.
Journal ArticleDOI
Urbanization and Disease Emergence: Dynamics at the Wildlife–Livestock–Human Interface
TL;DR: It is argued that these interfaces represent a critical point for cross-species transmission and emergence of pathogens into new host populations, and thus understanding their form and function is necessary to identify suitable interventions to mitigate the risk of disease emergence.
Journal ArticleDOI
Sensitivity of bats to urbanization: a review
TL;DR: Overall, bat sensitivity to urbanization makes these mammals promising candidates to track the effects of this process of land use change on the biota, but more studies, specifically tailored to explore this role, are needed.
Journal ArticleDOI
Adaptation and Adaptedness of Organisms to Urban Environments
Mark J. McDonnell,Amy K. Hahs +1 more
TL;DR: The urgent need to refine the terminology currently used to describe the adaptation of organisms to urban environments in order to improve scientific understanding and more effectively identify and communicate the actions required to create biodiversity- and adaptedness is highlighted.
Journal ArticleDOI
How Nature-Based Tourism Might Increase Prey Vulnerability to Predators
TL;DR: A framework to understand how behavioral changes associated with nature-based tourism can impact individual fitness, and thus the demographic trajectory of a population, is developed.
References
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
Integrating animal temperament within ecology and evolution.
Denis Réale,Simon M. Reader,Simon M. Reader,Daniel Sol,Daniel Sol,Peter T. McDougall,Niels Jeroen Dingemanse +6 more
TL;DR: It is proposed that temperament can and should be studied within an evolutionary ecology framework and provided a terminology that could be used as a working tool for ecological studies of temperament, which includes five major temperament trait categories: shyness‐boldness, exploration‐avoidance, activity, sociability and aggressiveness.
Journal ArticleDOI
Urbanization as a major cause of biotic homogenization
TL;DR: In this paper, a basic conservation challenge is that urban biota is often quite diverse and very abundant, and that, because so many urban species are immigrants adapting to city habitats, urbanites of all income levels become increasingly disconnected from local indigenous species and their natural ecosystems.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Ecology of Individuals: Incidence and Implications of Individual Specialization
Daniel I. Bolnick,Richard Svanbäck,Richard Svanbäck,James A. Fordyce,Louie H. Yang,Jeremy M. Davis,C. Darrin Hulsey,Matthew L. Forister +7 more
TL;DR: The collection of case studies suggests that individual specialization is a widespread but underappreciated phenomenon that poses many important but unanswered questions.
Book
Bird Song: Biological Themes and Variations
TL;DR: The study of bird song focuses on how song develops, sexual selection and female choice, and themes and variations in time and space.
Journal ArticleDOI
Biotic homogenization: a few winners replacing many losers in the next mass extinction
TL;DR: Emerging evidence shows that most species are declining and are being replaced by a much smaller number of expanding species that thrive in human-altered environments, leading to a more homogenized biosphere with lower diversity at regional and global scales.