DOI: 10.5061/dryad.rfj6q57j4
title: Data and code from: Impacts of urban heterogeneity in environmental and societal characteristics on coyote survival

description: Survival links individual-level responses to population, community, and
 ecosystem dynamics. Thus, understanding species’ survival responses to
 environmental change in urban areas is key for gaining insights into the
 ecology and management of wildlife in these rapidly expanding
 environments. Despite existing research on the broad-scale effects of
 urbanization on wildlife survival, little is known about how heterogeneity
 within urban areas impacts survival. We assessed the role of environmental
 and societal characteristics known to structure the distribution of
 resources and risks important for urban wildlife ecology on coyote (Canis
 latrans) survival in the Chicago metropolitan area. We conducted a
 time-varying Cox proportional hazards survival analysis using the
 telemetry data of collared animals. We found that human population density
 had a positive effect on survival rate, and that at high human population
 densities, median income had a negative effect on survival rate. We also
 found evidence that animals in areas with natural habitat features (e.g.
 natures preserves, city parks) have higher survival rates. This study adds
 to the growing literature demonstrating the significance of ecological
 heterogeneity in wildlife responses to urbanization and highlights
 society’s influence on wildlife survivorship in cities.
description: # Data and code from: Impacts of urban heterogeneity in environmental and
 societal characteristics on coyote survival
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.rfj6q57j4](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.rfj6q57j4) Time-varying Cox proportional hazards model to evaluate the effect of environmental and societal characteristics on coyote survival in the Chicago metropolitan area. ## Description of the data and file structure Files containing data collected at three spatial scales (250 m, 1 km, and 2km) - **model_df_250m_dryad.rdata**, **model_df_1km_dryad.rdata**, **model_df_2km_dryad.rdata** Each data frame contains the following columns: * id - animal ID * sex - female ("f") or male ("m") * track_duration - difference between mortality date or last location and date of first location (used to estimate survival time) * status - postmortem recovery (1) or censored (0) * tstart - estimated "age" at time of location based on date of first location * tstop - estimated "age" at time of next location based on date of first location * sf - territorial status  * nat_z - standardized proportion of natural habitat in a circular area surrounding the location * dist_z - standardized proportion of disturbed habitat in a circular area surrounding the location * road_z - standardized proportion of road in a circular area surrounding the location * med_inc_z - standardized median income in a circular area surrounding the location * prop_w_z - standardized proportion of white residents in a circular area surrounding the location * pop_dens_z - standardized proportion of white residents in a circular area surrounding the location  ## Code/Software The following code was run using the *survival* package (version 3.8-3; Therneau 2024) in R (version 4.4.1; R Core Team 2024). **cox_models.R** - Run time-varying Cox proportional hazards models R Core Team (2024). \_R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing_. *Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna,Austria.* [https://cran.r-project.org/src/base/R-4/R-4.4.1.tar.gz](https://cran.r-project.org/src/base/R-4/R-4.4.1.tar.gz) Therneau T (2024). *A Package for Survival Analysis in R*. R package version 3.8-3, [https://cran.r-project.org/src/contrib/Archive/survival/survival_3.8-3.tar.gz](https://cran.r-project.org/src/contrib/Archive/survival/survival_3.8-3.tar.gz).