Habitat mapping for wild game (Tetrao urogallus) in the Gesäuse National Park near Hieflau

Auerwild is subject to great hunting and cultural interest in the Alpine region. Due to its impressive size and impressive behavior during the balz, the Auerhahn shaped numerous stories, folk songs and legends among other things. Last but not least, it is included in the logo of numerous organisations and companies. However, the population of Auerwilde in Central Europe is declining sharply due to habitat loss. Many small deposits have already disappeared and in principle there are only isolated distribution islands (see Fig.1; LINER 2001). The porridge (Tetrao urogallus) is listed in Annex I to the European Birds Directive (Directive 2009/147/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 November 2009 on the conservation of wild birds) in the European Birds Directive (Directive 2009/147/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 November 2009 on the conservation of wild birds), so it is not only in the cultural but also in the conservation interest to preserve or restore suitable habitats with safe populations. Habitat mapping or habitat models are a way to determine habitat quality. They provide an actual status report and, in the event of future repetitions of habitat mapping, the grasping of implemented improvement measures can be checked in order to monitor success. The basis of this thesis is a mechanistic habitat model for Auerwild, which STORCH (1999) developed for habitat assessment in the Bavarian Alps. Statements about the suitability of a habitat for the wild game are derived from different habitat parameters. The correctness of the evaluations derived from this is then checked by means of indirect evidence of porridge. In the original design, habitat response and detection mapping of deer deposits refer to different areas (20 m radius for habitat surveys and 5 m radius for detection). In the present thesis, it is to be checked whether an increase in the reception area for indirect evidence can establish a better relation to the habitat parameters and thus further increase the significance of the habitat model. The sample area for detection was extended by four trabant areas in order to increase the area reference between habitat mapping and detection search in order to check a change in the validity of the model based on this detection area compared to the original model of STORCH.