Sustainable use can affect behavioral ecological and evolutionary processes in vertebrates: Crocodilians as models

Abstract When formal and traditional management of wildlife involves harvesting, the issue of biological sustainability is mostly focused on the degree to which removing a given number of individuals is likely to compromise population size or the potential to harvest in the future. The harvest alters the balance of population dynamics (i.e. rates of reproduction, mortality, immigration, emigration), the compensatory processes that result, and the types of management interventions needed to achieve sustainability. However, hunting by people over long periods of time has affected the behavioral ecology and evolutionary processes of many harvested species and may continue to do so in the future. Thus, genetic impacts of past hunting and approaches to current management may mitigate future selective pressures from hunting, but they are rarely considered. These possibilities are discussed here, especially with crocodilians, where various types of harvest and sustainable management occur.