Prof. John Fryxell, Department of Integrative Biology, spoke to CBCNews.ca about whether changes in human movement during this pandemic could be affecting animal behaviour.

Animals “respond to humans pretty quickly,” including changes in human movement, Fryxell said, citing how deer and elk change their behaviour when they know people are hunting near them.

But he cautioned against believing that reduced human movement due to pandemic-based self-isolation will have any long-term effects on animal populations.

The executive director of the Biodiversity Institute of Ontario and a member of the Royal Society of Canada, Fryxell studies animal ecology amid global change.