DETECTABILITY, PHILOPATRY, AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF DISPERSAL DISTANCES IN VERTEBRATES

Dispersal is of central importance to population biology, behavioral e cology and conservation. However, because field studies are based on f inite study areas, nearly all dispersal distributions for vertebrates currently available are biased, often highly so. The inadequacy of dis persal data obtained directly by traditional methods using population studies of marked individuals is highlighted by comparing the resultin g distributions with dispersal estimates obtained by radio-tracking an d by using genetic estimates of gene flow.