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Urban wildlife monitoring using citizen science suggests that European hedgehogs and badgers select different habitats
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Urban wildlife monitoring using citizen science suggests that European hedgehogs and badgers select different habitats
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Journal Article
Urban wildlife monitoring using citizen science suggests that European hedgehogs and badgers select different habitats
2025
Overview
Some wildlife species can successfully adapt to urban environments. To prevent potential conflict of these species with humans or their pets, a better understanding of the presence of urban wildlife is needed. However, traditional monitoring methods are often inadequate because many privately owned properties are inaccessible. In this study, we analyse reports of European hedgehogs (Erinaceus europaeus or E. roumanicus) and badgers (Meles meles) provided by two long-term citizen science projects in the city of Vienna, Austria – stadtwildtiere.at and roadkill.at – to assess habitat preferences and potential ecological interactions. Vienna has a human population of about 2×106 and covers an area of 415 km2, 50 % of which is green space in the form of forests, parks and private gardens. A total of 356 hedgehog and 918 badger sightings were reported between 2012 and 2023. Sightings of both species were positively associated with a mix of sealed/built-up areas and green spaces with meadows and shrubs. However, sightings of both species were negatively associated with arable land, most likely due to the avoidance of open terrain, reduced food availability or simply because both nocturnal species were more difficult to spot on dark arable land. The steeper the slope of a habitat, the fewer hedgehogs were reported, whereas for badgers, a positive correlation between slope and reports was observed in areas with built-up fractions over 15 %. Overall, we observed hardly any hedgehog reports in areas in which badgers were reported. We conclude that citizen science wildlife monitoring can be a good data source to better understand human–wildlife interactions and could therefore be a model for other urban areas and species.
