“Urine” for a Surprise with Conservation of Kangaroo Rats

In the first few weeks following release of prey species like kangaroo rats, predation can be intense.  During this initial period of establishment, kangaroo rats need to dig new burrows, making them especially vulnerable to predators.

Wildlife managers typically use electric fences to deter predators like coyotes and badgers from release sites or resort to shooting them, but crafty individuals are rarely stopped. To make matters worse, owls find electric fence posts to be ideal perch locations and can easily prey on exposed kangaroo rats. To improve translocation success we need an effective way to keep predators off these sites during the establishment phase.

Last summer, we tested whether placing mountain lion scent on a kangaroo rat release site would reduce visitation on this site by medium sized predators that prey on kangaroo rats compared to a control site with no lion scent. 

We placed 12 remote cameras on each site to gather data on visitation rates. These data are still coming in but our cameras are catching some fun and interesting footage of predators in action.
Coyotes were caught on video inspecting the scent and either bolting away or urinating on it. Bobcats appear to be avoiding the mountain lion scent entirely.

Interestingly, kangaroo rats are drawn to the mountain lion scent piles and many are digging their burrows into them! Three-quarters of the lion scent piles had kangaroo rat burrows dug into them at 1 month post-release compared to only 1/6 of control scent piles. These data suggest that kangaroo rats may be using mountain lion scent to confuse would be predators by masking their own scent.

There is much to do to fully understand the effectiveness of using top predator scent on prey species at release sites but early results are very promising.

We have designed an experiment that will compare visitation of coyotes on sites with either: mountain lion urine, wolf urine, horse urine or water with the hope of determining the most effective method of deterring smaller predators during the establishment phase and enhancing release success.

If it works on a large scale, we will have developed a new method for deterring predators and enhanced translocation methodology for many species.