Hofmeester, TR;
Rowcliffe, JM;
Jansen, PA;
(2017)
Quantifying the Availability of Vertebrate Hosts to Ticks: A Camera-Trapping Approach.
Frontiers in Veterinary Science
, 4
, Article 115. 10.3389/fvets.2017.00115.
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Abstract
The availability of vertebrate hosts is a major determinant of the occurrence of ticks and tick-borne zoonoses in natural and anthropogenic ecosystems and thus drives disease risk for wildlife, livestock, and humans. However, it remains challenging to quantify the availability of vertebrate hosts in field settings, particularly for medium-sized to large-bodied mammals. Here, we present a method that uses camera traps to quantify the availability of warm-bodied vertebrates to ticks. The approach is to deploy camera traps at questing height at a representative sample of random points across the study area, measure the average photographic capture rate for vertebrate species, and then correct these rates for the effective detection distance. The resulting "passage rate" is a standardized measure of the frequency at which vertebrates approach questing ticks, which we show is proportional to contact rate. A field test across twenty 1-ha forest plots in the Netherlands indicated that this method effectively captures differences in wildlife assemblage composition between sites. Also, the relative abundances of three life stages of the sheep tick Ixodes ricinus from drag sampling were correlated with passage rates of deer, which agrees with the known association with this group of host species, suggesting that passage rate effectively reflects the availability of medium- to large-sized hosts to ticks. This method will facilitate quantitative studies of the relationship between densities of questing ticks and the availability of different vertebrate species-wild as well as domesticated species-in natural and anthropogenic settings.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Quantifying the Availability of Vertebrate Hosts to Ticks: A Camera-Trapping Approach |
| Location: | Switzerland |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.3389/fvets.2017.00115 |
| Publisher version: | http://doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2017.00115 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright: © 2017 Hofmeester, Rowcliffe and Jansen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
| Keywords: | Ixodes ricinus, contact rate, forest wildlife, gas theory, host availability, passage rate, remote sensing, tick-borne disease |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences > Div of Biosciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences > Div of Biosciences > Genetics, Evolution and Environment |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1561386 |
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