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Description: |
x, 86 leaves : illustrations, charts ; 28 cm |
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Dissertation Note: |
M.S. Utah State University, Dept. of Forest, Range, and Wildlife Sciences 2006 |
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Bibliography Note: |
Includes bibliographical references. |
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Summary, Etc. Note: |
Summary: More methods are needed to minimize coyote (Canis latrans) depredation on livestock. One approach is to frighten predators away with disruptive stimuli. I performed a pilot study using a behavior-contingent scare device to protect a novel food. I used six pairs of captive coyotes (three treatments and three controls) to examine the hypothesis that a scare device would increase latency until food consumption. During each trial, I recorded the latency of coyotes to eat a novel food protected by a scare device. All control and treatment coyotes ate the food on the first day. However, there was a trend (t7=1.54, P=0.08) for coyotes to delay consumption when the scare device was present (mean latency=162s) versus the controls (mean latency=11s). A second observational pilot study examined the variation in the response of captive coyotes to the behavior-contingent scare device. I exposed 14 coyote pairs to the scare device for 2-week trials. Two pairs of coyotes ate the food on the first night, two pairs of coyotes persisted in trying to eat the food every night of the trial without success, and ten pairs of coyotes gave up attempting to obtain the food. A third experiment examined the effects of individual stimuli or a combination of stimuli on coyote habituation using 15 pairs of captive coyotes. Coyotes did not activate the scare device with different stimuli at significantly different rates (F2,15=1.26 P=0.32). However, a chi-square test of homogeneity of proportions showed that coyotes habituated to the three stimuli differentially (X^2=7.8, DF=2, P=0.02), with a larger proportion of coyotes specifically habituating to the sound-only treatment. Lastly, I analyzed the variables of gender, age, social status, rearing, and distance from another pen with a scare device to determine of they were predictors of trends in boldness or shyness. Social status was the only variable that predicted boldness, with subordinate coyotes being the most likely to attempt to eat novel and to eventually habituate to the scare device. |