Feral pig (Sus scrofa) activity and landscape feature revisitation across four sites in eastern Australia

Abstract

Quantifying feral pig movements and understanding the fine-scale ecological drivers of feral pig landscape use are important factors for optimising pest management programs. We tracked 59 GPS-collared feral pigs at four sites in eastern Australia between 2017 and 2021, for a mean of 375 ± 277 (s.d.) days. The mean number of successful GPS fixes was 15 577 ± 11 833 (s.d.) and these were recorded at 30-min intervals. We calculated mean hourly and daily distances travelled to determine feral pig activity and investigated the influence of sex, site, season and time of day on this activity. We also investigated the proximity of highly active sites to habitat covariates, along with intensity and frequency of site use. Male daily movement, 4.9 km (95% CI = 4.2, 5.6 km), was significantly greater than it was for females, 3.6 km (95% CI = 3.0, 4.1 km) and males maintained a high level of activity all night, while female activity was predominantly crepuscular. Study site was a significant determinant of daily movement, but season was not, across either sex or site. Highly-visited site selection was negatively associated with distance from creeks, dams, cultivation, open herbaceous vegetation and medium woody vegetation. Both medium woody vegetation and dam sites had the longest duration of use (3 and 2.7 h respectively) and the shortest time between visitations (14.5 and 13 h respectively). Quantifying feral pig activity and key habitat feature preference are important steps in improving management programs. Better prediction of feral pig movement and behaviour allows for more targeted placement of control tools, potentially increasing encounter rates.