Impacts of herbivory by wild ungulates represent a significant issue world-wide. To be effective, management of populations and impacts needs to be coordinated above the site scale, yet little research has investigated the appropriate spatial scale over which management should be integrated to be fully effective. In consideration of reduction of impacts in deciduous or mixed woodland habitats, we tested scale-specific management effectiveness in a lowland area of UK where moderate- to high-density populations of four deer species were the target of deliberate control programmes, and nonhuman predators were absent. We modelled the annual impact recorded between 2009 and 2015 in 98 woodlands as a function of cumulative culls of deer taken since the commencement of management. Analysis was repeated at different spatial scales by increasing the circular area around each focal woodland, from 2.5 km-radius up to 100 km-radius. Our findings suggest for the first time the geographical scale over which deer management needs to be coordinated for optimum effectiveness in decreasing their impact on woodland across relatively homogenous landscapes. For small bodied and relatively sedentary species (roe deer Capreolus capreolus; Reeves' muntjac Muntiacus reevesi), reductions in impacts within woodlands can be achieved by culling at the immediately local level, but some modest increase in effectiveness (probably relating to reductions in the degree of source-sink movement) may be expected with an increase in spatial scale of culling to around 30-70 km-radius. For larger-bodied, herding species with more extensive home-ranges (fallow deer Dama dama; red deer Cervus elaphus) management for reduction of woodland impacts was only really effective when coordinated above the single woodland-scale, with marked increases shown again up to a scale of 100 km-radius. Whilst future studies for different landscape types are still needed, our work emphasises that the spatial scale at which control plans are conducted can determine the effectiveness of wildlife management, possibly providing an advance on how to manage wildlife populations more effectively.

中文翻译：

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野生动物管理的规模依赖性有效性：以英国鹿为例。

野生有蹄类动物对草食的影响是世界范围内的重要问题。为使之有效，需要在场地规模以上协调人口和影响的管理，但是很少有研究调查适当的空间规模，应该对其进行整合以使其完全有效。考虑到减少对落叶林或混交林地栖息地的影响，我们在英国低地地区测试了规模特定的管理有效性，在英国低地地区，四种鹿的中高密度种群是有意控制计划的目标，非人为天敌缺席。我们对自管理开始以来2009年至2015年期间记录在98个林地中的年度影响进行了建模，以作为对鹿的累积剔除的函数。通过增加每个焦点林地的圆形区域（从2.5 km半径到100 km半径），在不同的空间尺度上重复进行分析。我们的研究结果首次提出了需要协调鹿管理的地理规模，以便在降低其对相对同质景观对林地的影响方面获得最佳效果。对于较小的身体和相对久坐的物种（ro）；里夫斯的unt鼠（Muntjac Muntiacus reevesi），可以通过直接在当地进行扑杀来减少对林地的影响，但效果会有所提高（可能与程度降低有关）可能会考虑到剔除的空间规模增加到约30-70 km半径。对于较大的身体 减少林地影响的管理范围更广的放牧物种（小鹿黄鹿；红鹿鹿）只有在单一林地规模以上协调时才真正有效，再次显着增加直至100 km -半径。尽管仍需要对不同景观类型进行未来研究，但我们的工作强调，实施控制计划的空间规模可以决定野生动植物管理的有效性，可能在如何更有效地管理野生动植物种群方面提供进展。