Effects of Tourism on the Habitat Use by a Threatened Large Rodent at a World Heritage Site

VERONICA A. BENINATO; CARLOS E. BORGHI; NATALIA ANDINO; MAURICIO A PÉREZ; STELLA M. GIANNONI

Animals

Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute

Año: 2021

2076-2615

The mara is a large endemic rodent, which presents a marked decline in its populations,mainly because of habitat loss, hunting, and overgrazing. The Ischigualasto Provincial Park is ahyper-arid protected area at the Monte Desert of Argentina with an overall low plant cover. Ourobjective was to determine the influence of environmental variables and tourist activities on mara?shabitat use. We used different biological levels to explain it, from plant community to floristiccomposition, in order to know at which level we can better detect the effects of tourist activities. Weregistered fresh feces and habitat variables along 80 transects in two communities, near and far awayfrom the tourist circuit. To evaluate habitat use, we fitted models at different biological levels: plantcommunity, plant strata, plant biological forms, and floristic composition. At the community andplant strata levels, we could not detect any tourism effects on habitat use. However, we detectedeffects of tourist activities on mara?s habitat use at the plant strata and floristic composition levels.Maras also selected areas with a low proportion of both bare soil and pebbles cover. We foundcomplex interactions between abiotic, biotic variables and tourism, studying mara?s places neartourism activities, probably because they perceive those places as predator-safe areas.