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AUTHORS: Angela Kujawa, Grand Valley State University; Paul Keenlance, Grand Valley State University; Alexandra Locher, Grand Valley State University; Robert Sanders, Little River Band of Ottawa Indians; Joseph Jacquot, Grand Valley State University
ABSTRACT: American marten (Martes americana) are slender-bodied mesocarnivores in the mustelid family. Across their range, marten have experienced habitat loss and fragmentation due to logging and fire, coupled with overharvesting. These factors led to marten being extirpated from Michigan’s Lower Peninsula (LP) in 1911, with reintroduction efforts beginning in 1985. Marten are commonly considered habitat specialists, associating with old-growth forests with a coniferous component. In Michigan’s Northern LP, marten have been found to utilize areas with large diameter trees, high basal areas and ~70% or greater canopy closure. Although marten are known to inhabit the LP, their range in not fully known. This study aims to determine habitat preferences of known marten populations in the LP to create a habitat suitability model across the Northern LP. Marten locations in the area, that have been collected since 2011 via VHF radio-telemetry and GPS collars, will be used to estimate home ranges and delineate habitat preferences. Variables determined to influence selection of an area as a home range will be used to create a habitat model which will be applied across the Northern LP to obtain a gradient of low to high quality marten habitat. Noninvasive sampling methods will be used to validate the model. A unit of one female’s home range in Michigan’s LP (6.24km2) will be used as the unit of measurement during validation. This study will provide novel research that managers can use to improve degraded habitat and conserve adequate habitat, benefiting Michigan’s marten populations.
