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A demographic, spatially explicit patch occupancy model of metapopulation dynamics and persistence

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dc.contributor.authorSutherland, Chris
dc.contributor.authorElston, D.
dc.contributor.authorLambin, X.
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Massachusetts - Amherst
dc.date2023-09-23T17:03:54.000
dc.date.accessioned2024-04-26T19:32:41Z
dc.date.available2024-04-26T19:32:41Z
dc.date.issued2014-11-01
dc.description.abstractPatch occupancy models are extremely important and popular tools forunderstanding the dynamics, and predicting the persistence, of spatially structuredpopulations. Typically this endeavor is facilitated either by models from classic metapopulationtheory focused on spatially explicit, dispersal-driven colonization–extinction dynamicsand generally assuming perfect detection, or by more recent hierarchical site occupancymodels that account for imperfect detection but rarely include spatial effects, such as dispersal,explicitly. Neither approach explicitly considers local demographics in a way that can be usedfor future projections. However, despite being arguably of equal importance, dispersal andconnectivity, local demography, and imperfect detection are rarely modeled explicitly andsimultaneously. Understanding the spatiotemporal occurrence patterns of spatially structuredpopulations and making biologically realistic long-term predictions of persistence wouldbenefit from the simultaneous treatment of space, demography, and detectability. Weintegrated these key ideas in a tractable and intuitive way to develop a demographic andspatially realistic patch occupancy model that incorporates components of dispersal, localdemographic stage-structure, and detectability. By explicitly relating stage-specific abundancesto measurable patch properties, biologically realistic projections of long-term metapopulationdynamics could be made. We applied our model to data from a naturally fragmentedpopulation of water voles Arvicola amphibius to describe observed patch occupancy dynamicsand to investigate long-term persistence under scenarios of elevated stage-specific localextinction. Accounting for biases induced by imperfect detection, we were able to estimate:stable, and higher than observed metapopulation occupancy; high rates of patch turnover andstage-specific colonization and extinction rates ( juvenile and adult, respectively); and juveniledispersal distances (average 2.10 km). We found that metapopulation persistence in thepresence of elevated extinction risk differed depending on which life stage was exposed, andwas more sensitive to elevated juvenile rather than adult extinction risk. Predictions ofpersistence when dynamics are stage-specific suggest that metapopulations may be moreresilient to changes in the environment than predicted when relationships are based on patchsize approximations rather than population sizes. Our approach allows explicit considerationof local dynamics and dispersal in spatially structured and stage-structured populations,provides a more detailed mechanistic understanding of metapopulation functioning, and canbe used to investigate future extinction risk under biologically meaningful scenarios.
dc.description.pages3149-3160
dc.identifier.doihttps://doi.org/10.1890/14-0384.1
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14394/37648
dc.relation.ispartofEcology
dc.relation.urlhttps://works.bepress.com/chris-sutherland/1/download/
dc.source.beginpage3149
dc.source.endpage3160
dc.source.issue11
dc.source.issue11
dc.source.issue95
dc.source.issue95
dc.source.statuspublished
dc.subjectabundance
dc.subjectArvicola amphibius
dc.subjectfalse negative
dc.subjectfragmentation
dc.subjecthierarchical model
dc.subjectmigration
dc.subjectsite occupancy
dc.subjectspatially realistic
dc.subjectmetapopulation theory
dc.subjectstate-space modeling
dc.subjectstochastic patch occupancy model
dc.subjectwater vole
dc.subjectBiology
dc.subjectLife Sciences
dc.titleA demographic, spatially explicit patch occupancy model of metapopulation dynamics and persistence
dc.typearticle
dc.typearticle
digcom.contributor.authorisAuthorOfPublication|email:csutherland@umass.edu|institution:University of Massachusetts - Amherst|Sutherland, Chris
digcom.contributor.authorElston, D.
digcom.contributor.authorLambin, X.
digcom.identifiernrc_faculty_pubs/390
digcom.identifier.contextkey9597021
digcom.identifier.submissionpathnrc_faculty_pubs/390
dspace.entity.typePublication
relation.isAuthorOfPublication1f6a3cee-7de8-4182-8905-f415163d3d37
relation.isAuthorOfPublication.latestForDiscovery1f6a3cee-7de8-4182-8905-f415163d3d37
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