Quantifying Wildlife at Cave Entrances

This article was originally published in The Midden – Great Basin National Park: Vol. 16, No. 1, Summer 2016.

The Journal of Cave and Karst Studies cover featured a ringtail cat caught on camera in one of the park caves.

By Gretchen Baker, Ecologist

What animals use cave entrances in Great Basin National Park? Remote cameras were deployed to answer that question during the summer of 2013. The cameras took photos when movement triggered them and were active 24 hours a day. Data from eight caves was analyzed. Cameras were deployed for a total of 372 trap days, with an average of 46.5 days per cave (range 28-62).

The cameras captured 632 trap events, with separate events defined as more than an hour apart for the same species. Of the seventeen taxa documented, the most abundant species photographed were mice, chipmunks, humans, woodrats, and squirrels. Other species observed in cave entrances included cottontail rabbits, bats, skunks, foxes, insects, birds, and domestic dogs.

Wildlife entered and exited caves most frequently between 1800 and 0600. The most common nocturnal animals were bats, mice, skunks, and ringtails. Animals most active during the day were chipmunks, humans, birds, and squirrels.

Species accumulation curves were increasing for most of the caves even after fifty days of deployment, indicating that it can take a long time to capture all the animal species that use a cave entrance.

Very little information has previously been documented about fauna using cave entrances. This non-invasive, repeatable technique can help managers learn more about the dominant and secretive species using the entrance and twilight areas of caves. This method also documents peak use times.

You can read more about what wildlife uses cave entrances in the entire article, found in the Journal of Cave and Karst Studies, Volume 77, number 3.