Mesud Abdullayev

That article is covering the Samur-Yalama National Park's biodiversity,  broad-leaf forest cover ,landscape  structure and historical background. The National Park has a size of 12,000 ha and is located in the north-eastern corner of Azerbaijan. The northern boundary of the National Park (NP) is the state border to Russia. The western boundary is formed by a railroad and in the east the park reaches the coastline of the Caspian Sea...

The forest cover change is affecting the living organisms in forestry habitats, and the change of rodents’ population dynamic can be a good example in that context. It is so often referred that small mammals are sensitive to the changes of environment as indicator species. While working in Ocsa city located 30 km away from Budapest, the research realized that the effects of management-based forestry activities change the small mammals' population dynamics, spatial distribution, habitat preferences, their diversity, and richness, etc., based on vegetation cover. It seems that habitat-related preference for these mammals is quite various and changeable, due to environmental factors, the microclimate of the habitat, and mating, nesting, hiding from predators, and so on. To realize how much the study areas significantly differ from each other due to forest regulation, the data collected from the study areas, and live-animal trapping (Sherman) methodology implemented.
The study areas separated into the climax (old forest existed), modified (young trees individuals existed and bushes cut), and clear-cut forests (an opening area covered by bushes and herbs). The clear-cut applied forest remained the small bushes and herbs; however, that plot's vegetation cover is changing by the time, due to succession of the vegetation. The aim is to understand how much the difference between these plots over the study years, and whether that changes only at the vegetation or it is also at the animal level. The research focused on the rodent species, such as voles, the mouse, and shrews respectively from these three plots and aimed to answer these questions.

1. Is there any difference between three habitats in vegetation based covers over the study years, if yes what is the difference?
2. Is there any difference between these three plots in small mammals’ population dynamic-related, if yes what is the difference?
3. Is there any correlation between habitats and small mammals’ population?

The study area was in Bugacpuszta, Hungary, the aim of the process was to capture the species up to 100 individuals to reintroduce them into the wilderness area of the southeast region of Hungary, close to Szeged city during the project time. The initial aim of the research was to enhance the trophic (food) chain of the eastern imperial eagle (Aquila heliaca, BirdLife International., 2019.), thereby their population will increase throughout the EU LIFE project. However, during the research, the question of the differences between the burrows range of the Spermophilus citellus (Linnaeus, 1766) came out and this article explains it with the comparison of the diameter and depth characteristics. Majority of the aquila heliaca population breeds in Hungary and Slovakia along the migration line.They mostly prefer for feeding for the suslik (Spermophilus citellus) and the hamster (Cricetus cricetus), as a prey. Eagles feed with the small mammals and birds widely (M.Horváth.,2014). The data was collected from 3 different plots in the study area, and later on was compared statistically to know whether there is a significant difference between the burrows' sizes, regarding soil topography related preferences by the Spermophilus citellus or not.The first plot area was being actively grazed by sheeps (initially covered by grass) and during the trapping time the species was trapped rarely, here 1-2 out of 100 traps per day, where close to the main-road. The second one was also covered by the same grass and plum trees, from the first glance here seemed quite ideal for this species to populate in, and during the latest summer and early autumn that area was highly preferred by this species, at least we can refer it by considering the caught animal numbers (8-10 caught out of 100 traps per day). Yet the trapping methodology and effectiveness of the trapping, habitat peferences, population dynamic and so on is another research's topic.