Data and code for: The welfare problems of wide-ranging Carnivora reflect naturally itinerant lifestyles
Creators: name: Mellor, Emma
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2023
Subjects: welfare
captivity
zoos
choice
control
Carnivora

description: Carnivora with naturally small annual home ranges can adjust well to the evolutionarily new environment of captivity, but wider-ranging species are vulnerable to stress. To investigate why, we identified eight correlates of home range size (reflecting energetic needs, movement, intra-specific interactions, and itinerant lifestyles). We systematically assessed whether these correlates predict welfare better than range size itself, using data on captive juvenile mortality (from 13,518 individuals across 42 species) and stereotypic route-tracing (456 individuals, 27 species). Rather than large ranges <em>per se, </em>itinerant lifestyles (quantified via ratios of daily to annual travel distances in nature) were found to confer risk, predicting greater captive juvenile losses and stereotypic time-budgets. This result<em> </em>advances our<em> </em>understanding of the evolutionary basis for welfare problems in captive Carnivora, helping to explain why naturally sedentary species (e.g. American mink) may breed even in intensive farm conditions, while others (e.g. polar bears, giant pandas) can struggle even in modern zoos/breeding centres. Naturally itinerant lifestyles involve decision-making and strategic shifts to new locations, suggesting that supplying more novelty, cognitive challenge and/or opportunities for control will be effective ways to meet these animals' motivational needs in captivity. Such findings could therefore assist with both collection planning and enclosure design.
description: <strong>Data and code for: Should I stay or should I go? The welfare problems of wide-ranging Carnivora reflect naturally itinerant lifestyles</strong> The files given here provide everything needed to replicate our results and three figures (Figures 2, 3 and S1). See Table S3 for full descriptions of calculations. Data files are suitable for use in Excel and/or R. Missing values indicated with 'NA'. An older dataset of previous work by us [2] was used for analyses shown in Table S2. This dataset is in a separate .csv file, and its metadata is described under its own heading below. <strong>Metadata for main analyses:</strong> Species: species scientific name Common_name: species common name RT: median % observations route-tracing Prop_no_FE: proportion of captive animals that did not (/unknown if they did) receive foraging enrichments Med_cover: median provision of cover within the enclosures of captive animals (ranked: 1 = poorest – 4 = best) CJM: captive juvenile mortality rates [% juveniles dying before 365 days; from 3] CIM: captive infant mortality rates [% infants dying before 30 days; see 1, 2] AEO: age when eyes first open [days; from 4] AHR: median annual home range size (km<sup>2</sup>; literature searches) CV: AHR's coefficient of variation BM: body mass [kg; from 4] IMN: individual metabolic need [from or calculated following: 5, 13, 14] GMN: group metabolic need [IMN x population size; the latter taken from 7, and following 12] Pro: regional productivity [g/m<sup>2</sup>; calculated using values from: 4, 6, 8] TN: trophic niche. From [4] and simplified to 1 = carnivores and 0 = omnivores/herbivores HM: % of diet that is self-hunted meat [from 15] Dens: population density [n animals per km<sup>2</sup>; from 4] T: territoriality. From [11]: 1 = territorial (defended home range); 0 = non-territorial (undefended home range) P: predation risk. From [9]: 1 = one or more known predator(s) (of adult animals); 0 = no reported predators (of adult animals) DDT: median daily distance travelled (km; literature searches) HV: hippocampal volume [ml; from 10] BVOL: brain volume [ml; from 10] DD_AD: ratio daily: annual travel distances calculated using AHR and DDT. <strong>Metadata for Kroshko et al. [2] dataset (Table S2)</strong> As above with the following extra describing species-typical husbandry: Med_encl: median enclosure size (m2) Med_vert: median ranked score for vertical complexity within the enclosure (1 = poorest – 4 = best) Prop_same_social: proportion housed in similar social grouping as per the wild Med_meals: median meal frequency per day Prop_fed_am: proportion fed in the morning (or morning and afternoon) versus afternoon only Med_diet_div: median diet diversity (count of different food types) Prop_starve: proportion of animals that have 1 or more starve days each week Prop_process: proportion of animals fed an entirely processed diet Med_study: median date of papers contributing to captive animal species summary statistics <strong>References</strong> Clubb, R. and G.J. 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Bininda-Emonds, J.L. Gittleman, G.M. Mace, and A. Purvis, <em>PanTHERIA: a species-level database of life history, ecology, and geography of extant and recently extinct mammals.</em> Ecology, 2009. <strong>90</strong>(9): p. 2648-2648. McNab, B.K., <em>Basal rate of metabolism, body size, and food habits in the order Carnivora</em>, in <em>Carnivore Behavior, Ecology, and Evolution</em>, J.L. Gittleman, Editor. 1989, Cornell University Press: Ithica, NY. p. 335-351. Stephenson, N., <em>Actual evapotranspiration and deficit: biologically meaningful correlates of vegetation distribution across spatial scales.</em> Journal of Biogeography, 1998. <strong>25</strong>(5): p. 855-870. Gittleman, J.L., <em>Carnivore Behavior, Ecology, and Evolution</em>. 1989, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Lieth, H., <em>Modeling the Primary Productivity of the World</em>, in <em>Primary Productivity of the Biosphere</em>, H. Lieth and R.H. 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Harvey, <em>Carnivore home-range size, metabolic needs and ecology.</em> Behavioural Ecology and Sociobiology, 1982. <strong>10</strong>: p. 57–63. McNab, B.K., <em>The Influence of Food Habits on the Energetics of Eutherian Mammals.</em> Ecological Monographs, 1986. <strong>56</strong>(1): p. 1-19. McNab, B.K., <em>Complications inherent in scaling the basal rate of metabolism in mammals.</em> Q Rev Biol, 1988. <strong>63</strong>(1): p. 25-54. Wilman, H., J. Belmaker, J. Simpson, C. de la Rosa, M.M. Rivadeneira, and W. Jetz, <em>EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals.</em> Ecology, 2014. <strong>95</strong>(7): p. 2027-2027. Funding provided by: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada<br>Crossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000038<br>Award Number: Funding provided by: University of Guelph<br>Crossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100008986<br>Award Number:
description: Data come from a range of sources; detailed collection methods are given in the Supporting Material with our paper. Route-tracing (an outcome) time-budgets for 27 captive Carnivora species, along with some husbandry data, came from a database comprising behavioural records collected between 1950–2016, and were gleaned via literature searches [also see 1, 2]. Inclusion criteria are described elsewhere [1, 2]. A second outcome variable, captive juvenile mortality rates of zoo-housed 42 Carnivora species between 2010–2019, came from Roller et al., [3]. Predictor variables describing wild annual home range sizes and 12 potential correlates were collected via literature searches [for methods and inclusion criteria see: 1, 2], and from published databases and papers [4–15]. For data collected via literature searches (e.g., route-tracing; annual home range size), we calculated species medians for those values (reported in our dataset).