Data describing species consumed by mountain lions during predation events in eastern Nevada, USA, 2018 to 2022
Dates
Publication Date
2024-04-30
Start Date
2018-01-24
End Date
2022-12-11
Citation
Schoenecker, K.A., Jackson, P., Iacono, P., Klugman, H., McPhail, M., Devine, C., Davis, J., and Stoner, D., 2024, Data describing species consumed by mountain lions during predation events in eastern Nevada, USA, 2018 to 2022: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/P13IGZUV.
Summary
This dataset consists of 1,353 ground observer investigations of mountain lion predation events ("kills") in eastern Nevada, USA, from 2018 to 2022. Over the period of the data collection, we had 29 mountain lions equipped with telemetry collars and we investigated clusters of locations when GPS collar locations were in the same area for three nights -- we used this criteria to identify potential predation events by mountain lions, and then hiked to the GPS cluster location on foot to search for a kill site and to identify the species consumed. Collared mountain lions were both males and females, and species consumed included mule deer, feral horses, bighorn sheep, coyotes, other mountain lions, badgers, beaver, or unknown. On some [...]
Summary
This dataset consists of 1,353 ground observer investigations of mountain lion predation events ("kills") in eastern Nevada, USA, from 2018 to 2022. Over the period of the data collection, we had 29 mountain lions equipped with telemetry collars and we investigated clusters of locations when GPS collar locations were in the same area for three nights -- we used this criteria to identify potential predation events by mountain lions, and then hiked to the GPS cluster location on foot to search for a kill site and to identify the species consumed. Collared mountain lions were both males and females, and species consumed included mule deer, feral horses, bighorn sheep, coyotes, other mountain lions, badgers, beaver, or unknown. On some occasions we hiked to a GPS collar cluster and were not able to find a kill. These data contain those incidents, as well as successful visits in which we identified the species consumed by the collared mountain lion. Note that data are a sample of mountain lion kill sites, not a complete and exhaustive list. Not every cluster was able to be investigated by ground observers, so these data represent a sample of predation events that occurred during the 4-year time period of data collection. Some lions have more predation events than others in the dataset, due to sampling technique.
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Predation_events_in_Nevada_2018_2022.xml Original FGDC Metadata
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Predation_events_in_Nevada_2018_2022.csv
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Purpose
Data were collected as part of a comprehensive field assessment of the diet of mountain lions and an assessment of the potential for diet switching by mountain lions after a wild horse gather and removal treatment (reducing the availability of horses as prey), in eastern Nevada, USA. The horse gather and removal was in December 2020.
