02/08/2017
Habitat preferences of small mammals occurring in two studied wetlands of the Žitný ostrov area
Veronika Hulejová Sládkovičová, Peter Miklós, Katarína Hollá, Veronika Búliková & Dávid Žiak
Folia faunistica Slovaca 21: 229–233
Abstract: The wetlands in fragmented agriculture landscape of Žitný ostrov offer changeable conditons, due to natural and anthropic pressure. Despite the high risk of extinction in such a fragmented habitat, there are no studies on habitat preferences of protected small mammals from this area. Hence we examined communities of small terrestrial mammals with occurrence of Microtus oeconomus mehelyi Éhik, 1928 on the territories of two wetlands at Žitný ostrov area. Totally 1092 individuals from 13 species of small mammals were recorded by live trapping. Habitat preferences of detected species were evaluated by direct gradient analysis of CCA. Species Apodemus flavicollis (Melchior, 1834) and Clethrionomys glareolus (Schreber, 1780) show high affinity for trees. Species Crocidura leucodon (Hermann, 1780), Crocidura suaveolens (Pallas, 1811), Microtus arvalis (Pallas, 1778), Sorex minutus Linnaeus, 1766, Micromys minutus (Pallas, 1771) prefer habitats with lower vegetation. The studied wetland habitats represent suitable conditions especially for dominant species Microtus oeconomus (Pallas, 1776) and Apodemus agrarius (Pallas, 1771). M. oeconomus preferred lower Carex overgrown, while its frequency decreases with increasing coverage of trees. On the contrary, A. agrarius preferred higher vegetation.
Received 9 August 2016 ~ Accepted 20 September 2016 ~ Published 27 December 2016 ~ DOI ffs.2016.21.20 ~ In English
http://www.ffs.sk/pdf/FFS-21-20-Hulejova-Sladkovicova-et-al-2016.pdf