Shared Landscapes, Shared Consequences: A Study of Human and Wildlife Interactions in the DMV

Abstract

Urbanization is rapidly reshaping wildlife behavior, increasing interactions between humans and wildlife, and complicating management and disease mitigation efforts. This analysis examines how urban environments influence wildlife movement, disease dynamics, and responses to human recreation, with a focus on white-tailed deer and other common urban mammals. In my first chapter, I investigated the movement patterns of white-tailed deer in urban environments to better understand how they utilize and traverse residential and natural spaces. As deer populations expand in developed areas, understanding their movement patterns becomes critical for managing zoonotic risks such as SARS-CoV-2. Deer were captured with drop-nets in urban parks in the Washington metropolitan area and fitted with GPS collars that recorded locations every 30 minutes. Spatial analysis of the GPS position data from the collars included a Step Selection Function model built with environmental and anthropogenic covariates, and a Brownian Bridge Movement model with isopleths at 50% and 95% levels. This analysis revealed how deer navigate urban spaces and which landscape features may influence their movement, providing insight into potential pathways for disease spread and opportunities for targeted management. In my second chapter, I evaluated how human recreation influences wildlife behavior in urban parks. Specifically, does on and off-trail human activity affect the timing of activity and the daily detection of white-tailed deer, raccoons, red foxes, and coyotes? Using trail camera data, wildlife responses to human presence were analyzed with Cox proportional hazards models and generalized linear mixed models. This analysis revealed how increased human foot traffic in parks can alter both spatial use and timing of wildlife activity. Together, these findings provide insight into how wildlife adapt to urban pressures and offer guidance on managing human–wildlife interactions and mitigating disease-transmission risks in increasingly urbanized landscapes.