Conservation ecology of crested newts : high site infidelity in a network of small ponds
Bibliographic record
Abstract
The crested newt, Triturus cristatus, is an emblematic and endangered amphibian species that is usually associated with large ponds, considered site faithful within a breeding season, and functioning in metapopulations.However, such large newt species can also be found in apparently suboptimal patches such as small-sized ponds (pools).Therefore, we aimed at better understanding its habitat use and dispersal strategies by innovative capturemark-recapture using RFID aquatic teletemetry in more than 100 shallow ponds from a protected area in Belgium.Data were analysed with multi-event models.We found out that such networks of small ponds can host thousands of crested newts.The population was composed of a highly pond faithful phenotype and a dispersing phenotype.Breeding site infidelity occurred at a high rate in both sexes within and between reproductive seasons.Most movements occurred between close ponds with few recaptures at the periphery of the study area.Our work highlights that in the presence of alternative aquatic habitats, newts exhibit not only habitat complementation (i.e.land and water) but also habitat supplementation (pond shift) and this, during the peak of the reproduction.These results have implications for our understanding of reproductive strategies of newts but also for their conservation.First, this shows that (apparently) suboptimal breeding habitats can be worth for conservation of crested newts when they are closely connected together and, second, very short distances among ponds (i.e.much under the « 400 m » usual target) can be important to sustain large newt populations.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.002 | 0.008 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.005 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".