Fission–fusion dynamics allow animals to manage costs and benefits of group living by adjusting group size. The degree of intraspecific variation in fission–fusion dynamics across the geographical range is poorly known. During 2008–2016, 38 adult female Cape buffalo were equipped with GPS collars in three populations located in different protected areas (Gonarezhou National Park and Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe; Kruger National Park, South Africa) to investigate the patterns and environmental drivers of fission–fusion dynamics among populations. We estimated home range overlap and fission and fusion events between Cape buffalo dyads. We investigated the temporal dynamics of both events at daily and seasonal scales and examined the influence of habitat and distance to water on event location. Fission–fusion dynamics were generally consistent across populations: Fission and fusion periods lasted on average between less than one day and three days. However, we found seasonal differences in the underlying patterns of fission and fusion, which point out the likely influence of resource availability and distribution in time on group dynamics: During the wet season, Cape buffalo split and associated more frequently and were in the same or in a different subgroup for shorter periods. Cape buffalo subgroups were more likely to merge than to split in open areas located near water, but overall vegetation and distance to water were very poor predictors of where fission and fusion events occurred. This study is one of the first to quantify fission–fusion dynamics in a single species across several populations with a common methodology, thus robustly questioning the behavioral flexibility of fission–fusion dynamics among environments.

In social species, the transmission and maintenance of infectious diseases depends on the contact patterns between individuals within groups and on the interactions between groups. In southern Africa, the Cape buffalo (Syncerus caffer caffer) is a vector for many pathogens that can infect sympatric livestock. Although intra‐group contact patterns of Cape buffalo have been relatively well described, how groups interact with each other and risks for pathogen transmission remain poorly understood. We identified and compared spatial behavior and contact patterns between neighboring groups of Cape buffalo under contrasting environments: within the seasonally flooded environment of the Okavango Delta in Botswana and the semi‐arid environment of northern Kruger National Park in South Africa. We used telemetry data collected between 2007 and 2015 from 10 distinct groups. We estimated seasonal overlap and proximity between home ranges of pairwise neighboring groups, and we quantified seasonal contact patterns between these groups. We defined contact patterns within variable spatiotemporal windows compatible with the transmission of diseases carried by the Cape buffalo: bovine tuberculosis, brucellosis, and Rift Valley fever (mosquito‐borne transmission). We examined the effects of habitat and distance to water on contact location. In both study populations, neighboring buffalo groups were highly spatially segregated in the dry and rainy seasons. Inter‐group contact patterns were characterized by very few direct and short‐term indirect (within 0–2 days) contacts, lasting on average 1 hour and 2 hours, respectively. Contact patterns were generally consistent across populations and seasons, suggesting species‐specific behavior. In the drier study site, the probability of indirect and vector‐borne contacts generally decreased during the dry season with increasing distance to water. In the seasonally flooded area, only the probability of vector‐borne contact decreased with increasing distance to water. Our results highlight the importance of dry season water availability in influencing the dynamics of indirectly transmitted Cape buffalo pathogens but only in areas with low water availability. The results from this study have important implications for future modeling of pathogen dynamics in a single host, and the ecology and management of Cape buffalo at the landscape level. © 2021 The Authors. The Journal of Wildlife Management published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of The Wildlife Society.

Interfaces between protected areas and their peripheries in southern Africa are subject to interactions between wildlife and livestock that vary in frequency and intensity. In these areas, the juxtaposition between production and conservation land uses in a context of increasing anthropisation can create issues associated with human-wildlife coexistence and raises concerns for biodiversity conservation, local development and livelihoods. This literature review aimed at addressing the need to consolidate and gather in one article current knowledge on potential uses of satellite remote sensing (SRS) products by movement ecologists to investigate the sympatry of wildlife/domestic ungulates in savanna interface environments. A keyword querying process of peer reviewed scientific paper, thesis and books has been implemented to identify references that (1) characterize the main environmental drivers impacting buffalo (Syncerus caffer caffer) and cattle (Bos taurus & Bos indicus) movements in southern Africa environments, (2) describe the SRS contribution to discriminate and characterize these drivers. In total, 327 references have been selected and analyzed. Surface water, precipitation, landcover and fire emerged as key drivers impacting the buffalo and cattle movements. These environmental drivers can be efficiently characterized by SRS, mainly through open-access SRS products and standard image processing methods. Applying SRS to better understand buffalo and cattle movements in semi-arid environments provides an operational framework that could be replicated in other type of interface where different wild and domestic species interact. There is, however, a need for animal movement ecologists to reinforce their knowledge of remote sensing and/or to increase pluridisciplinary collaborations.

Theory predicts that high population density leads to more strongly connected spatial and social networks, but how local density drives individuals’ positions within their networks is unclear. This gap reduces our ability to understand and predict density-dependent processes. Here we show that density drives greater network connectedness at the scale of individuals within wild animal populations. Across 36 datasets of spatial and social behaviour in >58,000 individual animals, spanning 30 species of fish, reptiles, birds, mammals and insects, 80% of systems exhibit strong positive relationships between local density and network centrality. However, >80% of relationships are nonlinear and 75% are shallower at higher values, indicating saturating trends that probably emerge as a result of demographic and behavioural processes that counteract density’s effects. These are stronger and less saturating in spatial compared with social networks, as individuals become disproportionately spatially connected rather than socially connected at higher densities. Consequently, ecological processes that depend on spatial connections are probably more density dependent than those involving social interactions. These findings suggest fundamental scaling rules governing animal social dynamics, which could help to predict network structures in novel systems.

Human activities can affect the behaviour and fitness of wildlife. However, the response of animals to nonlethal human activities has not been well‐studied in wild boar, Sus scrofa, even though it is a widespread species in Europe and has become of increasing concern because of crop damages and its vector capacity for diseases. We study the behavioural responses of GPS‐collared wild boar to nonlethal experimental human approaches in the Bohemian Forest Ecosystem along the border between Germany and the Czech Republic. We describe and quantify the flight responses of the animals and assess whether they vary with the distance to recreational paths and the occurrence of hunting in the area. We show that wild boar were disturbed and displaced by human approaches on foot in 69% of the trials, but the average flight initiation and escape distances were relatively small (93 and 256 m, respectively). The probability of a flight response decreased with distance from the paths and increased with the ruggedness of the terrain. In the non‐hunting zone, the flight initiation distances and flight durations were shorter than in the hunting zone. Our results suggest a weak effect of nonlethal human disturbances on the movement of wild boar, although the animals were sensitive to the perceived risk in relation to recreation infrastructure and hunting. For the management of diseases such as African swine fever, it can be concluded that nonlethal disturbances are unlikely to accelerate the spread of the disease due to far‐distance movements. Guidelines for restrictions in case of an outbreak might be adjusted accordingly.

Diseases circulating at the wild–domestic animal interface are increasingly difficult to control due to human encroachment into wildlife habitats. Understanding the factors driving wild animals to visit livestock farms is crucial for reducing the risk of disease outbreaks with severe economic and social consequences. In this study, we quantified the contact rate at the wild boar–domestic pig interface across Europe using a large‐scale dataset of wild boar GPS tracking and domestic pig farm geolocations. We estimated wild boar contact rate with pig farms at hourly and monthly scales and analysed the influence of environmental, wild boar‐ and farm‐related variables. Across 187 tracked wild boars and 457 pig farms, we detected 3322 contact events, with a highly skewed contact distribution: only 5% of wild boars and 1% of farms accounted for 50% of all events. On average, each wild boar had 1.59 contacts per month with a given farm (95% CI: 1.33–1.85) and 2.58 contacts per month when considering all farms located within its monthly home range (95% CI: 1.62–3.53). Seasonal variation differed between sexes, with a bimodal distribution for males with contact rates peaking in March and August–September, and a slight increase in contact rate throughout winter for females. Monthly contact rate increased with forest cover, human footprint, wild boar population density and individual proximity to pig farms. Farms with more built infrastructure faced fewer contacts, and larger farms had higher contact rates. Contacts occurred mostly after sunset and around sunrise. Synthesis and applications . Our results highlight the need to incorporate wild boar spatio‐temporal behaviour and farm context into strategies aimed at reducing contact at the wild–domestic pig interface. While physical barriers and avoiding unintentional feeding remain essential, targeted measures during high‐risk periods, such as night‐time surveillance in summer and autumn, especially around large farms in wooded landscapes or areas with high wild boar density, could help reduce contact occurrence.