Comparison of trap- and radio-revealed home ranges of the brush-tailed possum (Trichosurus vulpeculaKerr) in New Zealand lowland forest

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Abstract
Four brush-tailed possums were fitted with radio transmitters and located hourly on 3 nights each month for 2 years. The home ranges found by this technique are compared with those revealed by live-trapping on a 30 × 30 m interval grid in lowland indigenous forest during the same 2-year period. The minimum-area method, a modified minimum-area method, range lengths, 3 boundary-strip methods, and Koeppl's elliptical method are compared. Estimates of home range based on trap-revealed and radio-revealed data differed greatly; the areas of home ranges found by the use of radios were mostly considerably larger than those revealed by live-traps. The activity centres of the home ranges found by trapping corresponded well with those found by radio-tracking.