Investigation of the effects of marble quarries on wildlife with phototrap method

The area where has habitat fragmentation and loss is expected to be lower mammalian fauna than in the other areas of similar habitat. Based on this hypothesis, the mammal fauna of the marble quarries area where the habitat fragmentation and loss are experienced and the similar habitats in the nearby habitat were compared with the phototrap method in total 240 km2 area and the effects of the marble quarries on the mammal fauna were investigated. As a result of 20 phototrap cameras and 4,734 phototrap.days observations, 16,995 records of 12 mammal species were recorded in the study area. The target species of the study were determined as wolf (Canis lupus), jackal (Canis aureus), fox (Vulpes vulpes), lynx (Lynx lynx), wild boar (Sus scrofa) and hare (Lepus europaeus). As a result of the comparison of the natural control area and marble quarry area where habitat fragmentation and loss occurs with the target species in the quarry area the wolf and fox were statistically higher in the control area in terms of the number of records, and although there was no statistically significant difference, wild boar and lynx were also higher numbers in the control area. The more records confirm our hypothesis of the thesis. The fact that the jackal, which is known to be more in the regions where human activities are present and hare are statistically higher in the area of marble quarries did not validate the hypothesis of the thesis for all species. As a result, habitat fragmentation and loss from marble quarries have been found to adversely affect mammal species.