As human populations increase, habitat destruction and fragmentation are rapidly altering the landscape, making it less able to support wildlife. The 220-acre rural campus of Pfeiffer University in Misenheimer, NC is representative of land use in general in the Carolina piedmont, consisting of some developed area, young pine and hardwood forests, and early successional areas that are regrowing from recent logging of loblolly pine. According to Webster, et al. (1985) and based on the habitats we have on campus, there are 36 species of wild mammals (excluding bats) we could expect to find in our area. We questioned how many of these species may actually be residing on or visiting our campus. This project aims to use multiple surveying methods to determine which species are present on our campus.
To date, we have sureyed using motion-sensitive cameras, Sherman traps, wooden rabbit traps, fecal collection, and direct observation in forested areas, along forest edges, and in early successional fields. We have mapped all trapping locations on aerial images of campus using Google Earth Pro©to help visualize the distribution of species in various habitats.
Results/Conclusions
We have so far identified the presence of 12 wild mammal species on campus: Odocoileus virginianus, Canis latrans, Urocyon cinereoargenteus, Vulpes vulpes, Procyon lotor, Didelphis virginiana, Sciurus carolinensis, Ondatra zibethicus, Sylvilagus floridanus, Tamias striatus, Peromyscus leucopus, Blarina brevicauda. Our trapping efforts will continue through 2019 as part of an undergraduate research project (KH's).
Once we know the mammal community composition in our area, we can begin to ask deeper questions about the functional biodiversity present and what might be causing the absence of certain species. We will be able to investigate the interactions of these species with each other and their environment and the ecosystem functions they provide, such as seed dispersal, soil turnover, nutrient cycling, and more.