Individual specialization in the use of space by frugivorous bats

Author(s)

Kerches-Rogeri, Patricia ^[1] ; Niebuhr, Bernardo Brandao ^{[2, 1, 3, 4]} ; Muylaert, Renata Lara ^{[1, 5]} ; Mello, Marco Aurelio Ribeiro ^[6]

Affiliation

^[1] Univ Estadual Paulista UNESP, Inst Biociencias, Rio Claro - Brazil

^[2] Inst Procarnivoros, Atibaia - Brazil

^[3] Inst Chico Mendes Conservacao Biodiversidade ICMB, Ctr Nacl Pesquisa & Conservacao Mamiferos Carnivo, Atibaia - Brazil

^[4] Swedish Univ Agr Sci, Uppsala - Sweden

^[5] Massey Univ, Hopkirk Res Inst, Mol Epidemiol & Publ Hlth Lab, Palmerston North - New Zealand

^[6] Univ Sao Paulo, Inst Biociencias, Dept Ecol, Sao Paulo - Brazil

• Document type: Journal article
• Source: Journal of Animal Ecology; v. 89, n. 11, p. 2584-2595, NOV 2020.
• Web of Science Citations: 0

Abstract

Natural populations are not homogenous systems but sets of individuals that occupy subsets of the species' niche. This phenomenon is known as individual specialization. Recently, several studies found evidence of individual specialization in animal diets. Diet is a critical dimension of a species' niche that affects several other dimensions, including space use, which has been poorly studied under the light of individual specialization. In this study, which harnesses the framework of the movement ecology paradigm and uses yellow-shouldered batsSturnira liliumas a model, we ask how food preferences lead individual bats of the same population to forage mainly in different locations and habitats. Ten individual bats were radiotracked in a heterogeneous Brazilian savanna. First, we modelled intraspecific variation in space use as a network of individual bats and the landscape elements visited by them. Second, we developed two novel metrics, the spatial individual specialization index (SpatIS) and the spatial individual complementary specialization index (SpatICS). Additionally, we tested food-plant availability as a driver of interindividual differences in space use. There was large interindividual variation in space use not explained by sex or weight. Our results point to individual specialization in space use in the studied population ofS. lilium, most probably linked to food-plant distribution. Individual specialization affects not only which plant species frugivores consume, but also the way they move in space, ultimately with consequences for seed dispersal and landscape connectivity. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 18/20695-7 - A synthesis of the assembly rules of complex ecological systems
• Grantee: Marco Aurelio Ribeiro de Mello
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• FAPESP's process: 07/03415-6 - Bat's fruit selection: preference or opportunism?
• Grantee: Tiago Yamazaki Andrade
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• FAPESP's process: 15/17739-4 - Landscape effects and the interaction between mammals and hantavirus in the Atlantic Forest
• Grantee: Renata de Lara Muylaert
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• FAPESP's process: 14/24219-4 - Individual specialization in the use of space and diet by the frugivorous bat Sturnira lilium
• Grantee: Patrícia Kerches Rogeri
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• FAPESP's process: 07/03405-0 - Do fruit bats perform directed dispersal?
• Grantee: Patrícia Kerches Rogeri
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation