Abstract

Interspecific competition can strongly influence patterns of space use in animal communities, particularly between closely related species, and may be exacerbated in marginal habitat. This may be important in Madagascar, as lemurs face diminishing resources due to deforestation. We examined the range overlap and spatiotemporal relationships of three species of frugivorous lemur in the fragmented forests of Kianjavato, Madagascar. We conducted simultaneous location and behaviour sampling of black-and-white ruffed lemurs, Varecia variegata, red-fronted lemurs, Eulemur rufifrons, and red-bellied lemurs, Eulemur rubriventer, at two sites over a period of 11 months. We used Doncaster's index of dynamic interaction to investigate the relative amount of time species spent within 30 m and 100 m of each other, compared to the time expected based on random use of location points. All three species showed low core range overlap compared to home range overlap, and while core overlap was higher between interspecific groups than intraspecific groups, the difference was not substantial. Conversely, no spatiotemporal avoidance was observed, and red-fronted lemurs showed positive association (indicating possible attraction) with both red-bellied and ruffed lemurs. These positive spatiotemporal associations may be related to shared resource use in small forests, or predation avoidance strategies. At present, these species may rely more on spatial segregation and niche separation than spatiotemporal avoidance to minimize interspecific competition.

Keywords

attraction; avoidance; coexistence; competition; dynamic; interspecific; static

Published in

Animal Behaviour
2019, Volume: 155, pages: 53-65

UKÄ Subject classification

Ecology
Behavioral Sciences Biology


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2019.06.025

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/122228