Biotemas (Mar 2012)
Seasonal variation of the wildlife fauna run over on the road MG 354, Southern Minas Gerais – Brazil
Abstract
The aim of this work was to evaluate the seasonal variation of wildlife animals run over on 13km of the road MG 354, Southern Minas Gerais, Brazil. Thirty-six monitorings were carried out for one year using a bicycle (20km/h) to sample amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals run over. We categorized individuals with more and less than 500g to estimate the impacts of running over with regard to the size of the animals and evaluated the seasonal variation in the running over rates (individuals/km/day). The smaller animals were the prevalent ones in our samplings, with 87% of the run over animals weighting less than 500g. We believe that the low speed of monitoring used in our work has increased the detection rate of smaller animals; however, this hypothesis needs to be tested. The season with higher running over rates was Summer, which differed significantly from Spring, mainly because of the increase in reptiles run over in Summer. We observed the following sequence in the running over rates: Summer > Fall > Winter > Spring. We believe that the rainfall regimes in our study area are responsible for the seasonal variation of running over.
