4. What happened to the house mouse: modelling the occupancy of Mus musculus in an Argentine city considering its urban growth.

ANTONELLI, CECILIA ROCÍO; PRIOTTO, JOSÉ W.; DE ANGELO, CARLOS; SAN MIGUEL, TOMÁS VALENTÍN; GOMEZ, M.D.; PROVENSAL, MARÍA CECILIA

Congreso; 7th International Conference on Rodent Biology and Management; 2022

This work aimed to estimate occupancy probabilities of Mus musculus (house mouse) as afunction of environmental (NDVI and distance to water bodies) and anthropogenic(proportion of paved streets, distances to illegal dumpsites and railways) variables and toexplore the differences in occupancy according to temporal changes of urban growth. Weused occupancy models to obtain predictive maps of M. musculus distribution in the cityof Río Cuarto in periods 2001-2003 and 2020, which was validated on the ground. Theobtained map for the first period showed that the highest occupancy probabilities agreedwith paved areas following a gradient to the outskirt of the city, where the lowestoccupancy values coincided with those areas without any buildings and with high valuesof vegetation cover. The obtained map for 2020 showed that the house mouse expandedits distribution range in the city, with low-medium probability values in zones where it wasabsent in the previous period. Data obtained from field validation would support thereliability of our predictive map. This work reinforces the importance of integrating spatialanalysis, environmental and anthropogenic variables and occupancy data in an urbanarea. Mus musculus expanded its range of distribution in the city accompanying theincrease in urbanization that Río Cuarto has experienced in the last 20 years. Consideringthe importance of M. musculus as an indicator of environmental degradation in urbanareas, the occupancy model obtained is a very useful tool available to the authorities ofthe city of Río Cuarto to be used in decision-making regarding urban planning and rodentcontrol programs.