Modeling the Influence of Forest Structure on Microsite Habitat Use by Snowshoe Hares

Table 2

Akaike’s Information Criterion adjusted for small sample size (AIC_c) for the a priori set of candidate models considered to examine the influence of stem cover units (SCU = 3 × coniferous saplings + deciduous saplings/ha), percent overhead canopy closure (CC), basal area (m²/ha) of snags and deciduous and coniferous trees (BA), and percent understory lateral foliage density (ULFD) on snowshoe hare pellet density (pellets/ha/month) within 25 microsite plots during winters 1996 and 1998, north-central Maine.

Model^a	Rank	𝐾^b	Log (L)^c	AICc	ΔAICc	Model likelihood	𝑤𝑖^d
SCU + CC	1	4	−224.69	459.37	0	1.00	0.81
SCU	2	3	−227.80	462.74	3.36	0.19	0.15
SCU + CC + BA + ULFD	3	6	−224.47	465.60	6.23	0.04	0.04
CC + ULFD	4	4	−235.48	480.97	21.59	0	0
CC	5	3	−237.07	481.29	21.92	0	0
BA	6	3	−237.97	483.08	23.71	0	0
ULFD	7	3	−238.39	483.91	24.54	0	0
YEAR	8	3	−238.47	484.07	24.70	0	0
ULFD + BA	9	4	−237.35	484.70	25.33	0	0

aSCU: positive effect on snowshoe hare pellet density; CC: negative effect; BA: negative effect; ULFD: positive effect.
bK: number of estimable parameters.
cLog (L): log-likelihood = −𝑛/2∗log(𝜎²) (Burnham and Anderson 2002 [47]).
^d𝑤_𝑖: Akaike weight.