The U.S.A.’s forests are mostly fragmented. Divide and conquer and defeating the enemy in detail works in war as well as against wild mammals. Mammals are having a tough time of it. I would think especially so when there are a lot of people venturing in and through via highways. Mammals tend to become road kills and stew meat themselves with easy human access.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24273-mammals-in-fragmented-forests-die-out-within-25-years.html?cmpid=RSS|NSNS|2012-GLOBAL|online-news#.UkSlAdKsg6Y
The good news is that the pace of deforestation in the Amazon has slowed down a little.
An interesting article in New Scientist today noted that mammals die off in fragmented forests. The process takes only 25 years.
