Studying Wildlife Movement in a Southern California Nature Preserve

In the last year, my research has focused on studying the response of wildlife in San Diego, CA to recreation in a nature preserve. My partners for this project was the City of San Diego, Open Space, the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and the San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG).

A little background about the preserve: This research was conducted in the Del Mar Mesa nature preserve, a small preserve within the limits of the City of San Diego. The trails in this area were illegally created by immigrant camps, but are now primarily used by bikers and hikers. Since 2008, all trails except for one main fire road through the preserve have been closed awaiting approval by a Natural Resource Management Plan for the area. Very high levels of illegal mountain biking and hiking persist despite closure.

Why this study is important: This nature preserve is the home for multiple threatened, endangered, and/or endemic plant and animal species such as San Diego fairy shrimp, San Diego horned lizards, and San Diego Button Celery. Also, the preserve has had known sightings of mountain lions, bobcats, coyotes, and deer, which were the focus of the study. Because of increasing urbanization, habitats that are suitable for these large mammals are severely reduced, limiting connectivity and wildlife corridors between open space areas in Southern California. As human recreation and development creeps closer to wildlife habitats, it is vitally important to study how we interact with these animals, influence their movement, and how they respond to our activities in changing numbers.

Our study: We split up the study in three parts:

(1) Pre-Enforcement: observe wildlife movement and human activity with only minimal enforcement by rangers in the area.

(2) Enforcement: introduce a targeted enforcement regime aimed to reduce human recreation. See how wildlife responds to a park with decreased/eliminated recreation.
(Conducted by California Fish & Wildlife wardens, funded by SANDAG.)

(3) Post-Enforcement: see if the changes caused by enforcement "stick", how long it takes for wildlife movement and human recreation numbers to decrease.

Results: 
We found that when human recreation was sharply decreased, animals responded relatively quickly by altering their temporal movement patterns. Previously, animals were only captured on camera at times like 2-4am. I found that when human numbers were decreased, many animals responded by using the trails more readily, and many of the cameras captured animals around 7am, then again at 5pm. Previously, these were heavy use mountain biking times (before work and after work).

Further data analysis will be conducted with the help of USGS, and presented in mid-April.

Mountain Lion Conservation Work in the Bolivian Amazon

One of my favorite and most career-defining work came in 2012 when I worked with a remote animal sanctuary in the Bolivian Amazon. This group was Comunidad Inti Wara Yassi, a Bolivian-run organization that works with conservation in the region. The sanctuary I worked at, Parque Ambue Ari, had mainly large cats--pumas, jaguars, ocelots, Geoffrey's cats, and margays. The sanctuary also hosted many more interesting animals like tapirs, deer, and multiple different species of birds and monkeys. 

Rural Bolivia near Santa Cruz de la Sierra

My work was with the pumas that were named after the organization--Inti, Wara, and Yassi. They were three sisters that all were housed in the same enclosure. 

Yassi and Wara, puma sisters

The majority of my responsibilities with the sisters were taking them on long walks (yes, like a dog) through their trails outside their enclosures. While this is a rather "unique" approach for a sanctuary, it was an amazing experience. 

Walking Inti through her trails in the Amazon

Despite the never-ending mosquitos, large strange-colored flying bugs, rats, cockroaches, water-bourne illness, and the other joys that come with field work in the rainforest, it was all worth it to know that we were helping wildlife that truly had no where else to go. Many of these animals were rescued from roadside zoos, poachers, and even from the estates of drug lords. Parque Ambue Ari provided a "forever home" to many of these cats, who can be happy, healthy, and well-fed. It was incredibly rewarding to spend long days out in the swamps walking with Inti, Wara, and Yassi!