Variability in the movement and foraging behaviour of female Eurasian lynx during the denning season across Europe

Abstract

Animal movement and reproductive behaviour are crucial components of ecological and evolutionary processes. After parturition, the behaviour of reproducing females adapts to the needs of their offspring, including thermoregulation, protection and food provisioning. However, little is known about how these adaptations vary across environmental conditions at larger scales in species with large distribution ranges. Here, we explored how female Eurasian lynx Lynx lynx movement and predation patterns change during the denning season. We analysed GPS telemetry data from two different climatic regions in Europe, cold and temperate, and evaluated the effect of explanatory variables on movement metrics and kill-to-den distances using generalized additive mixed models. Female lynx moved significantly longer daily distances in the cold region (central and northern Scandinavia) compared to the temperate region (southern Scandinavia and continental Europe) both before and after parturition. Reproducing females in both regions considerably reduced their movement after the start of the denning season. The typical pattern of increasing daily movements and decreasing time spent at the den with time persisted across regions, and the presence of females at the den followed a similar circadian rhythm, regardless of the markedly different daylight period. Only in the cold region females increased the distances of their excursions from the den as time passed. The distances between den and kill sites spanned from 1 to 3 km over the latitudinal range. The kill-to-den distances did not increase with time, but in the cold region the larger prey killsites were farther from the den than in the temperate region. Overall, our results show how some behaviours of female lynx during the denning season remain constant over a large latitudinal range, while others vary. This suggests local adaptations to particular environments, and possible increased energetic demands of reproducing females in more extreme environmental conditions.