Seasonality, local resources and environmental factors influence patterns of brown bear damages: implications for management

Abstract

Coexistence of humans and large carnivores is a major challenge for conservation and management, especially in human‐modified landscapes. Ongoing recovery of some large carnivore populations is good conservation news, but it also brings about increased levels of conflict with humans. Compensation payments and preventive measures are used worldwide as part of conservation programmes with the aim of reducing such conflicts and improving public attitude towards large carnivores. However, understanding the drivers triggering conflicts is a conservation priority, which helps prevent and reduce damages. Here, we have analysed the spatio‐temporal patterns of brown bear Ursus arctos damages to apiaries, crops and livestock in the two small, isolated and endangered bear populations in northern Spain. The increase in the number of damages varied in parallel with the increase in bear numbers, which is probably a primary cause determining the occurrence on damages. Damages also varied among years, seasons and bear populations and seemed to mainly depend on the local availability of natural food items, weather conditions and the availability of apiaries and livestock. Fluctuating availability of food items may explain the frequency of conflicts, which is yet another call to apply preventive measures in carnivore damage to human property in seasons and years when natural food availability is lower than usual. Understanding and preventing damage is in turn essential to mitigate conflicts where humans and large carnivores share the same landscape.