Urbanisation threatens biodiversity globally, yet some animal populations persist within urban landscapes. Conservation of urban wildlife has prioritised parks and remnant bushland as critical habitat and neglected the role that residential gardens offer for conservation. We explored the potential for residential gardens to assist the conservation of mammals using an online questionnaire administered to residents of two case study cities in Australia to identify how widespread mammals in cities can be, which garden features promote mammal presence, and if the features varied among species with different habitat requirements. From 649 responses we found that three mammal species with different habitat requirements occurred in residential gardens throughout the city landscape. Garden features promoting mammal presence were consistent with broad ecological and habitat requirements of each species, but differed among both species and regions. Our study demonstrates that residential gardens offer a valuable habitat for mammals, and that garden features could be manipulated to promote use of gardens by these species. By considering gardens in urban planning and management actions aimed at conserving urban wildlife, residential gardens offer additional habitat to parks, roadside vegetation and urban bushland, and can play a significant role in biodiversity conservation.

中文翻译：

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不断变化的世界中的哺乳动物保护：城市花园可以发挥作用吗？

城市化在全球范围内威胁着生物多样性，但一些动物种群仍存在于城市景观中。对城市野生动植物的保护已将公园和剩余的灌木丛列为重要栖息地，并忽略了住宅花园对保护的作用。我们通过对澳大利亚两个案例研究城市的居民进行在线问卷调查，探索了住宅花园有助于保护哺乳动物的潜力，以确定城市中哺乳动物的分布范围，哪些花园特征促进了哺乳动物的生存以及这些特征之间的差异具有不同生境要求的物种。从649份答复中，我们发现在整个城市景观的居住花园中出现了三种具有不同生境要求的哺乳动物。促进哺乳动物存在的花园特征与每个物种的广泛生态和栖息地要求一致，但在物种和地区之间却有所不同。我们的研究表明，住宅花园为哺乳动物提供了宝贵的栖息地，并且可以通过操纵这些花园的功能来促进花园的利用。通过在旨在保护城市野生生物的城市规划和管理行动中考虑花园，住宅花园为公园，路边植被和城市丛林提供了额外的栖息地，并可以在生物多样性保护中发挥重要作用。并且可以操纵这些花园的特征来促进这些物种对花园的利用。通过在旨在保护城市野生生物的城市规划和管理行动中考虑花园，住宅花园为公园，路边植被和城市丛林提供了额外的栖息地，并可以在生物多样性保护中发挥重要作用。并且可以操纵这些花园的特征来促进这些物种对花园的利用。通过在旨在保护城市野生生物的城市规划和管理行动中考虑花园，住宅花园为公园，路边植被和城市丛林提供了额外的栖息地，并可以在生物多样性保护中发挥重要作用。