Experimental protocol to repel opossums (Didelphis marsupialis) through an artisanal odor repellent device
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17533/udea.rccp.v35n4a01Keywords:
aversive conditioning, deterrent, Didelphis marsupialis, human-opossum conflict, odors, opossums, repellents, urban wildlife, wildlife, wildlife managementAbstract
Background: The human-opossum (Didelphis marsupialis) conflict has increased during the last decades mainly due to natural habitat loss, and mediated by generalist and opportunistic habits of opossums. A potential solution to reduce this conflict is to discourage the presence of opossums in human settlements without affecting the welfare of either part. Objective: To develop an artisanal odor device and test three chemical substances (citronella, ammonia, and creolin) for their separate effectiveness to drive away opossums. Methods: We first attracted local opossums using fruits or canned sardines as bait in an urban natural park (n=2 sites) and a peri-urban forest reserve (n=4 sites), both located in the Municipality of Envigado, Province of Antioquia, Colombia. Then we installed odor devices containing one of the three chemicals on each site and let them there during two weeks. The test was repeated with each of the chemicals in all sites. The number of opossum visits per night was recorded daily using camera-traps with bait and bait+chemical. Results: We found that ammonia and creolin were associated to fewer opossum visits per night. Citronella did not reduce the presence of opossums. In addition, the number of opossums/per night was higher in the urban park compared with the forest reserve. Conclusion: We suggest to further test the repellent effect of ammonia and creolin on real human-opossum conflict scenarios; however, caution is warranted given their irritant, flammable, and corrosive properties.
Downloads
References
Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry ATSDR. Toxicological profile for ammonia. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, Atlanta, GA; 2004. 1-6 p. [access date: August 22, 2021] URL: https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxprofiles/tp126.pdf
Alcaldía de Envigado. Plan de Desarrollo 2016-2019. 2016. [access date: August 16, 2021] URL: https://www.envigado.gov.co/pot/paginas/contenido/programas-y-politicas/programa-1
Alcaldía de Envigado. Informe final del SILAPE; 2018. [access date: August 22, 2021] https://www.envigado.gov.co/planeacion/SiteAssets/010_ACORDEONES/DOCUMENTOS/2018/09/Informe_final_Silape.pdf
Borden JH. Semiochemicals and bark beetle populations: Exploitation of natural phenomena by pest management strategists. Holarctic Ecol 1989; 12(4): 501-510. DOI: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3682061
Brown WL, Eisner T, Whittaker RH. Allomones and kairomones: transspecific chemical messengers. Bioscience 1970; 20 (1): 21-22. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1294753
Delgado CA. Muerte de mamíferos por vehículos en la vía del Escobero, Envigado (Antioquia), Colombia. Actual Biol 2007; 29(87): 229-233. DOI: https://revistas.udea.edu.co/index.php/actbio/article/view/329342
Elmeros M, Winbladh JK, Andersen PN, Madsen AB, Christensen JT. Effectiveness of odour repellents on red deer (Cervus elaphus) and roe deer (Capreolus capreolus): a field test. Eur J Wildl Res 2011; 57(6): 1223-6. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-011-0517-y
Flórez-Oliveros FJ, Vivas-Serna C. 2020. Zarigüeyas (Chuchas Comunes) Marmosas y Colicortos. Fundación Zarigüeya – FUNDZAR, Medellín, Colombia. p. 49-50. [access date: September 2, 2021] URL: https://www.metropol.gov.co/libro-zarigueyas
Gaston KJ. Valuing common species. Science 2010; 327(5962): 154-155. DOI: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1182818
González-Caro S, Vásquez A. Estado de los bosques de Antioquia entre 1990-2015. In: Quintero-Vallejo E, Benavides AM, Moreno N,
González-Caro S, editors. Bosques Andinos, Estado Actual y Retos para su Conservación en Antioquia. Medellín, Colombia: Fundación Jardín Botánico de Medellín Joaquín Antonio Uribe - Programa Bosques Andinos (COSUDE). 2017; p. 63-80. [access date: September 22, 2021] URL: http://www.bosquesandinos.org/wpcontent/uploads/2018/01/Libro_Bosques_Andinos_Interactivo.pdf
Guerisoli MM, Pereira JA. Deer damage: A review of repellents to reduce impacts worldwide. J Environ Manage 2020; 271: 110977. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110977
Hunt, C. (1984). Behavioral responses of bears to tests of repellents deterrents and aversive conditioning. MSc Thesis, University of Montana; 1984. 136 p. [access date: December 2, 2021] URL: https://scholarworks.umt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=8081&context=etd
Kamal HZ, Ismail TN, Arief EM, Ponnuraj KT. Antimicrobial activities of citronella (Cymbopogon nardus) essential oil against several oral pathogens and its volatile compounds. Padjajaran J Dent 2020; 32(1): 1-7. DOI: https://doi.org/10.24198/pjd.vol32no1.24966
Landa, A., & Tømmerås, B. Å. Do volatile repellents reduce wolverine Gulo gulo predation on sheep? Wildlife Biol 1996; 2(3): 119-126. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2981/wlb.1996.041
Landa, A., Krogstad, S., Tømmerås, B. Å., & Tufto, J. 1998. Do volatile repellents reduce wolverine Gulo gulo predation on sheep? Results of a large-scale experiment. Wildlife Biol 1998; 4(2): 111-118. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2981/wlb.1998.008
Mason JR. Mammal repellents: options and considerations for development. In: Proceedings of the Vertebrate Pest Conference 1998 (Vol. 18, No. 18). DOI: https://doi.org/10.5070/V418110271
McCrum-Gardner E. Which is the correct statistical test to use? Br J Oral Maxillofac Surg 2008; 46(1): 38-41. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bjoms.2007.09.002
McManus JJ. 1970. Behavior of captive opossums, Didelphis marsupialis virginiana. Am Midl Nat 1970; 84(1): 144-169. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/2423733
Müller GC, Junnila A, Butler J, Kravchenko VD, Revay EE, Weiss RW, Schlein Y. Efficacy of the botanical repellents geraniol, linalool, and citronella against mosquitoes. J Vector Ecol 2009; 34: 2-8. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1948-7134.2009.00002.x
Norman DM, Mason JR, Clark L. Capsaicin effects on consumption of food by cedar waxwings and house finches. Wilson Bull 1992; 104(3): 549-51. DOI: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4163197
O'Connell-Rodwell CE, Rodwell T, Rice M, Hart LA. Living with the modern conservation paradigm: ¿Can agricultural communities co-exist with elephants? A five-year case study in East Caprivi, Namibia. Biol Conserv 2009; 93(3): 381-391. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0006-3207(99)00108-1
Orjuela OJ, Jiménez G. Estudio de la abundancia relativa para mamíferos en diferentes tipos de coberturas y carretera, finca hacienda Cristales, área Cerritos - La Virginia, municipio de Pereira, departamento de Risaralda - Colombia. Univ Sci 2004; 9: 87-96. [access date: December 2, 2021] URL: https://revistas.javeriana.edu.co/index.php/scientarium/article/view/5028
Osborn FV, Parker GE. Community-based methods to reduce crop loss to elephants: Experiments in the communal lands of Zimbabwe. Pachyderm 2002; 33: 32-38.
Redpath SM, Bhatia S, Young J. Tilting at wildlife: reconsidering human–wildlife conflict. Oryx. 2015; 49(2):222-5. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0030605314000799
Rueda MC, Ramírez GF, Osorio JH. Aproximación a la biología de la zarigüeya común (Didelphis marsupialis). Bol Cient Mus Hist Nat 2013; 17(2): 141-153. DOI: http://www.scielo.org.co/pdf/bccm/v17n2/v17n2a13.pdf
Sharma, R, Rao R, Kumar S., Mahant S, Khatkar S. Therapeutic potential of citronella essential oil: a review. Curr Drug Discov Technol 2019; 16(4): 330-339. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2174/1570163815666180718095041
Smith, T. S., Herrero, S., Debruyn, T. D., Wilder, J. M. Efficacy of bear deterrent spray in Alaska. J. Wild Manag 2008, 72(3), 640-645. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2193/2006-452
Srbek-Araujo, A. C., Chiarello, A. G. Influence of camera-trap sampling design on mammal species capture rates and community structures in southeastern Brazil. Biota Neotrop 2013; 13, 51-62. DOI: http://www.biotaneotropica.org.br/v13n2/en/abstract?article+bn02013022013
Sunquist ME, Austad SN, and Sunquist F. Movement patterns and home range in the common opossum (Didelphis marsupialis). J Mamm 1987; 68(1): 173-176. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1381069
Vaughan C S, Hawkins L F. Late dry season habitat use of common opossum, Didelphis marsupialis (Marsupialia: Didelphidae) in neotropical lower montane agricultural areas. Rev Biol Trop 1999; 47(1-2): 263-269.
Vearrier, D., Jacobs D, Greenberg MI. Phenol toxicity following cutaneous exposure to creolin®: A Case Report. J Med Toxicol 2015; 11: 227–231. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13181-014-0440-1
Winfree R, W. Fox J, Williams NM, Reilly JR, Cariveau DP. Abundance of common species, not species richness, drives delivery of a real‐world ecosystem service. Ecol Lett 2015; 18(7): 626-35. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.12424
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2021 Revista Colombiana de Ciencias Pecuarias
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
The authors enable RCCP to reprint the material published in it.
The journal allows the author(s) to hold the copyright without restrictions, and will allow the author(s) to retain publishing rights without restrictions.