EVALUATION OF HARE ABUNDANCE ALLOWED BY THEIR USE OF ATTRACTION POINTS

Studied the space use by hares (Lepus granatensis) which was affected by wooden stakes placed in an open grassland at Donana Biological Reserve (SW Spain). Densities of hare pellets on plots centered on the stakes were higher than on plots not centered on them. The use of stakes by hares seems to be related either to an anti-predator behaviour or to a social behaviour of ground marking. Neither the time nor spatial variation in hare abundance was related to food supply or to the herbaceous layer characteristics. Rather, the seasonal abundance of hares in the study area depended on the flooding patterns of adjacent plant communities. The use of stakes as an improved version of the pellet-count method is proposed. This modified method considerably reduces the sampling effort necessary to carry out realistic estimations of spatial and seasonal variations in the relative abundance of hares in open fields.