Institut für Epidemiologie und Pathogendiagnostik
Mammals can cause considerable damage in reforestations. This is particularly relevant in view of large-scale forest conversion due to changing climate conditions. Climate-adapted forest structures are likely to cause a changed mammal community, which could lead to changing damage dynamics and changing dynamics of zoonotic pathogens. In addition, the more diverse food spectrum in reforestations is likely to change the diet of wild animals and consequently the microbiome and its functional interaction with the host. This could have a positive impact on the resistance against pathogens.The project aims to analyse these aspects along the causal chain of forest conversion - wildlife community - food choice - gut microbiome - pathogen community. The composition of the mammal community, intrinsic determinants (reproductive patterns, food choice, microbiome) and the pathogen community in reforestation areas will be assessed in the desired future forest communities. The focus of the investigations will be on rodent species as reservoirs and vectors of zoonoses, wild and domestic animal diseases and forest pests that pose a threat to forest conversion and thus jeopardize the achievement of climate protection goals. Rodent communities will be characterised based on the trapping of other participants. DNA-based analyses will provide high-resolution data on the species-specific composition of the diet, microbiome and pathogen community. Damage assessments in young trees will be used to estimate the damage potential. The occurrence of larger mammals, their choice of food, their microbiome, the pathogens they introduce and their contact with rodents and the damage to young trees will be analysed with data from wildlife cameras, damage assessments and DNA-based fecal analyses. In the JKI subproject, suitable areas will be selected where the composition of the small mammal community, the dynamics of the main species, reproductive activity, food preferences, etc. will be determined using animals snap-trapped by the partners/SMEs or organ samples from these animals. Standard methods that have been applied in numerous previous projects will be used. The composition of the large mammal community and the dynamics of the main species are recorded using camera traps. This results in taxon-specific relative abundance indices that can be correlated with damage (partner), microbiome (partner) and pathobiome (partner). The data on rodent species, abundance and accompanying data from forest monitoring will be combined with the results from SP1/2. In addition, abundance-damage relations are derived and damage thresholds are determined.The project investigates the following hypotheses: 1. Forest conversion creates more diverse mammal communities 2. More diverse mammal communities have a higher damage potential in reforestation due to increased browsing of young trees3. Forest conversion promotes a more diverse diversity of plant species causing a more diverse food composition for mammals 4. A more diverse food composition leads to a more diverse gut microbiome 5. A diverse gut microbiome increases the host's immune competence against zoonotic pathogens 6. Forest conversion leads to a reduced exposure of mammals to zoonotic pathogens through the interaction of a) reduced pathogen transmission through increased diversity of mammalian hosts (dilution effect) and b) a cascade of effects via food and microbiome diversity on microbiome diversity on resistance to pathogens. The testing of these hypotheses enables forecast of previously unknown effects of the planned large-scale forest conversion on biodiversity (mammal communities) and human health (zoonotic pathogens), animals (microbiome/ pathogens), and plants (browsing/ food preference). In addition, important findings for the academic field (climate impact research, forest ecology, wildlife ecology) will be gained.
Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space
