Ecology of an Ocelot Population at the Northern Edge of the Species' Distribution in Northern Sonora, Mexico
Ecology of an ocelot population at the northern edge of the species' distribution in northern Sonora, Mexico James C. Rorabaugh1, Jan Schipper2, Sergio Avila-Villegas3, Jessica A. Lamberton-Moreno4 and Timothy Flood5 1 Saint David, AZ, USA 2 Arizona Center for Nature Conservation, Phoenix Zoo, South Mountain Environmental Education Center, Phoenix, AZ, United States of America 3 Sierra Club, Tucson, AZ, USA 4 Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection, Tucson, AZ, USA 5 Friends of Arizona Rivers, Phoenix, AZ, USA ABSTRACT We used data from eight years of camera trapping at Rancho El Aribabi, a cattle ranch and conservation property in northern Sonora, Mexico, to examine the ecology of the northern-most known breeding population of ocelots (Leopardus pardalis). Ocelots were found mostly in two discrete and disjunct areas: a riverine riparian canyon at just less than 1,000 masl elevation and along arroyos in an oak-mesquite savanna in the Sierra Azul at 1,266–1,406 masl. An ocelot was also detected at a site between those two areas, in an area of a Sonoran desertscrub-foothills thornscrub ecotone at 1,300 masl. At least 18 ocelots, both males and females, were detected during the 2007– 2011 and 2014–2018 sampling periods. A female with a kitten was documented in 2011. No individual ocelots were photographed in both areas, which are separated by a minimum of 11.29 km, and no individuals were photographed in both time periods. In a binary logistic regression, key environmental variables predicting ocelot presence were, in order of importance, distance to a paved road, distance to human habitation, proximity to water, and an anthropogenic influences index that was dominated by Submitted 8 July 2019 cattle.
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