Research overview: functional versus structural connectivity

Connectivity has two distinct meanings often conflated in conservation, and this overview clarifies them. Structural connectivity describes the physical arrangement of habitat, whether patches are close and linked by corridors, independent of any animal. Functional connectivity describes whether animals actually move between patches, integrating structure with the species' behavior, perceptual range, and willingness to cross gaps. A landscape may look structurally connected yet be functionally fragmented if cats refuse to traverse the intervening matrix, or vice versa. The overview explains why functional connectivity, measurable only through movement or genetic data, is what ultimately matters for population persistence, and why telemetry and step-selection analysis are essential to assess it. Distinguishing the two prevents the error of assuming that nearby habitat is necessarily reachable habitat for felids.