%0 Journal Article
%T Dietary Response of Sympatric Deer to Fire Using Stable Isotope Analysis of Liver Tissue
%A William David Walter
%A Teresa J. Zimmerman
%A David M. Leslie
%A Jr.
%A Jonathan A. Jenks
%J Wildlife Biology in Practice
%D 2009
%I Sociedade Portuguesa de Vida Selvagem
%X Carbon (¦Ä13C) and nitrogen (¦Ä15N) isotopes in biological samples from large herbivores identify photosynthetic pathways (C3 vs. C4) of plants they consumed and can elucidate potential nutritional characteristics of dietary selection. Because large herbivores consume a diversity of forage types, ¦Ä13C and ¦Ä15N in their tissue can index ingested and assimilated diets through time. We assessed ¦Ä13C and ¦Ä15N in metabolically active liver tissue of sympatric mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) and white-tailed deer (O. virginianus) to identify dietary disparity resulting from use of burned and unburned areas in a largely forested landscape. Interspecific variation in dietary disparity of deer was documented 2¨C3 years post-fire in response to lag-time effects of vegetative response to burning and seasonal (i.e., summer, winter) differences in forage type. Liver ¦Ä13C for mule deer were lower during winter and higher during summer 2 years post-fire on burned habitat compared to unburned habitat suggesting different forages were consumed by mule deer in response to fire. Liver ¦Ä15N for both species were higher on burned than unburned habitat during winter and summer suggesting deer consumed more nutritious forage on burned habitat during both seasons 2 and 3 years post-fire. Unlike traditional methods of dietary assessment that do not measure uptake of carbon and nitrogen from dietary components, analyses of stable isotopes in liver or similar tissue elucidated ¦Ä13C and ¦Ä15N assimilation from seasonal dietary components and resulting differences in the foraging ecology of sympatric species in response to fire.
%K Burned
%K C3
%K C4
%K Carbon isotopes
%K Nitrogen isotopes
%K Odocoileus hemionus
%K O. virginianus
%K Unburned.
%U http://socpvs.org/journals/index.php/wbp/article/view/10.2461-wbp.2009.5.13