TY - JOUR
T1 - Spatiotemporal dynamics of cattle behavior and resource selection patterns on East African rangelands
T2 - evidence from GPS-tracking
AU - Liao, Chuan
AU - Clark, Patrick E.
AU - Shibia, Mohamed
AU - DeGloria, Stephen D.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by the Australian Agency for International Development; Cornell University; Toward Sustainability Foundation; and United States Agency for International Development.
PY - 2018/7/3
Y1 - 2018/7/3
N2 - Characterizing cattle behavior is crucial to inferring fine-scale resource selection patterns and improving rangeland management. However, our understanding of cattle behavior and resource selection on the extensive African rangelands suffers from a lack of quantitative, continuous and inter-seasonal monitoring of cattle movement. Based on integration of GPS-tracking and field observations, this study links cattle behavioral types with statistical parameters of movement, analyzes spatiotemporal dynamics of behavior and predicts resource selection patterns in Borana Zone of southern Ethiopia. We find that different cattle behavioral types were associated with distinct ranges of movement velocity. Distribution of identified cattle behavior varied substantially within the day and along the distance gradient from camp locations. Vegetation greenness, topography, study site, herding strategy and season were dominant factors influencing foraging areas selection by cattle. Research findings suggested that extensive herding through camp relocation can promote forage uptake while reducing energy spent on traveling. Future modeling of cattle resource selection needs to be based on longer-term GPS-tracking data and incorporate additional social, environmental, institutional and cultural factors to better interpret the complexity associated with cattle behavior in extensive grazing systems.
AB - Characterizing cattle behavior is crucial to inferring fine-scale resource selection patterns and improving rangeland management. However, our understanding of cattle behavior and resource selection on the extensive African rangelands suffers from a lack of quantitative, continuous and inter-seasonal monitoring of cattle movement. Based on integration of GPS-tracking and field observations, this study links cattle behavioral types with statistical parameters of movement, analyzes spatiotemporal dynamics of behavior and predicts resource selection patterns in Borana Zone of southern Ethiopia. We find that different cattle behavioral types were associated with distinct ranges of movement velocity. Distribution of identified cattle behavior varied substantially within the day and along the distance gradient from camp locations. Vegetation greenness, topography, study site, herding strategy and season were dominant factors influencing foraging areas selection by cattle. Research findings suggested that extensive herding through camp relocation can promote forage uptake while reducing energy spent on traveling. Future modeling of cattle resource selection needs to be based on longer-term GPS-tracking data and incorporate additional social, environmental, institutional and cultural factors to better interpret the complexity associated with cattle behavior in extensive grazing systems.
KW - Cattle behavior
KW - Ethiopia
KW - GPS-tracking
KW - pastoralism
KW - resource selection
KW - spatiotemporal dynamics
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U2 - 10.1080/13658816.2018.1424856
DO - 10.1080/13658816.2018.1424856
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85040960668
VL - 32
SP - 1523
EP - 1540
JO - International Journal of Geographical Information Science
JF - International Journal of Geographical Information Science
SN - 1365-8816
IS - 7
ER -