capercaillie habitats Assessing the spatio-temporal pattern of winter sports activities to minimize disturbance in capercaillie habitats Flyer Logger Fotofalle Laptop Festplatte und stick Visitenkärtli Pointer Keywords: GPS logging, backcountry skiing, snowshoeing, Tetrao urogallus, wildlife management, visitor management, recreation ecology, human wildlife conflict, Biosfera Val Müstair Move workshop, 27.10.2011 Martin Wyttenbach, master student, Zentr. Naturmanagement ZHAW

Disturbance of capercaillie habitats Bild tiere im winter Info wildtiere Capercaillies loos energy when disturbed in their winterhabitats. -> lower reproduction rate -> death -Y devitalisation Bild: Roland Graf

Problems Assessing spatial disturbance effects of wintersport activities on capercaillies Identify and quantify the capercaillie habitats affected by backcountry skiers and snowshoers Find a measure to describe disturbance intensity -> suggest management actions

GPS-Logging Skitourenrouten Val Müstair Skitouren val müstair fokus piz daint Start Touren 2009 Tschierv Start Touren 2010 Piz Dora Piz Turettas Karte: Swisstopo 1:200`000

Ascent Piz Dora Piz Dora Karte: Swisstopo 1:200`000

Spatial analysis data GPS tracks (ski-/snowboard- and snowshoetours) and official routes were used as vector line data All other data were converted into raster (cell size 25 m) buffer of 100 m around GPS tracks (capercaillie flushing distance)

1. Line density (simple density) Spatial analysis 1. Line density (simple density) Density of GPS tracks within a range of 100 m for each raster cell (km/km2). A straight crossing through the density extent of one raster cell is 200 m (equalling a density of 0.2 km / 0.0314 km2). Calculation of crossings Total numer of crossings per raster cell (n) n = (L1 + L2) D D L1: 170 m L2: 230 m D: 200m

Spatial analysis 2. Counting Translation of relative densities into absolute numbers (combination of GPS tracking and data from camera traps) Camera traps: 69 recreationalists per week (average count) dataset: 70 GPS tracks passing through the camera trap location -> density from GPS track data used in the analysis represents an average number of crossings per week

Spatial analysis 3. Classification 1) not affected = no crossings at all; 2) low = 1 to 3 (includes single trips with roaming patterns); 3) medium = 4 to 24 (4) intense = 25 and more.

Overall densities Karte: Swisstopo 1:200`000

Capercaillie core habitat Wildhüter wilma (datenquelle Auerhuhngebiet)

Improvements Trips as vector point data (points per area as a measure for disturbance) Seperate class for brakes -> method to define brakes Differenciate ascent and descent Further methods to assess spatio-temporal use by recreationalists? Analysis of behavior refering to official routes and activitys?

Thank you for your attention!

Questions Further methods to assess spatio-temporal use by recreationalists? Precision of classification; expl: low 1 – 3 crossings including roaming patterns -> identification and classification of roaming patterns Analysis of behavior refering to official routes and activitys?