Search

BackgroundUnderstanding rhino movement behavior, especially their recursive movements, holds significant promise for enhancing rhino conservation efforts, and protecting their habitats and the biodiversity they support. Here we investigate the daily, biweekly, and seasonal recursion behavior of rhinos, to aid conservation applications and increase our foundational knowledge about these important ecosystem engineers.MethodsUsing relocation data from 59 rhinos across northern Namibia and 8 years of sampling efforts, we investigated patterns in 24-h displacement at dawn, dusk, midday, and midnight to examine movement behaviors at an intermediate scale and across daily behavioral modes of foraging and resting. To understand recursion patterns across animals' short and long-term ranges, we built T-LoCoH time use grids to estimate recursive movement by each individual. Comparing these grids to contemporaneous MODIS imagery, we investigated productivity's influence on short-term space use and recursion. Finally, we investigated patterns of recursion within a year's home range, measuring the time to return to the most intensively used patches.ResultsTwenty four-hour displacements at dawn were frequently smaller than 24-h displacements at dusk or at midday and midnight resting periods. Recursion analyses demonstrated that short-term recursion was most common in areas of median rather than maximum NDVI values. Investigated across a full year, recursion analysis showed rhinos most frequently returned to areas within 8-21 days, though visits were also seen separated by months likely suggesting seasonality in range use.ConclusionsOur results indicate that rhinos may frequently stay within the same area of their home ranges for days at a time, and possibly return to the same general area days in a row especially during morning foraging bouts. Recursion across larger time scales is also evident, and likely a contributing mechanism for maintaining open landscapes and browsing lawns of the savanna.

Olfactory lures are important pest control tools, being widely used to attract animals to detection devices, traps, and poisons. For small mammals, like commensal rodents, almost all lures are foods. For invertebrates, however, semiochemical lures predominate and have done so for decades. Semiochemical lures overcome the inherent limitations of food-based lures, such as their perishability and inconsistent odour properties, and poor performance when foods are abundant. They can also provide benefits like low cost, ease of handling, and in-field longevity. Semiochemical lures for rodents would be a major advance, like that achieved for invertebrate monitoring and control, but their discovery has been constrained by the complexity of the challenge. Our research group is the first to achieve animal response-guided semiochemical lure discovery. We statistically integrated rapid field-based bioassays with scent chemical profiling and partial least squares regression to identify and test a suite of new single- and multi-compound rat lures. Field trials identified a tetrad and dyad mixture as the best performing lures, with an attraction rate of 0.61 and 0.60, respectively, compared to an attraction rate of 0.55 for the peanut butter standard. In total, 17 compound-based lures performed statistically as well as the peanut butter standard. We are currently working with an industry partner to encapsulate the lures as consumable, cost-effective pest-control products. Semiochemical lures will be particularly useful for multi-kill traps, toxic bait delivery devices, and remote monitoring devices that could operate for long periods without intervention. These devices offer substantial control program cost reductions but require long-life lures to realise their full potential.

Olfactory lures are important tools in pest-species management, being widely used to monitor and trap populations. For vertebrates like rats, lures are most commonly foods such as peanut butter. However, these are perishable and require frequent replenishment; factors that decrease control operation efficacy and increase costs. Synthetic semiochemical-based lures might address these limitations, but their identification and use for vertebrate population management remains an underexploited opportunity. We used headspace solid-phase microextraction and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry to characterise the volatile chemical profiles of 19 food products previously presented to wild, free-ranging rats and assessed for attraction. Partial least squares regression identified 10 of the 111 compounds found in two or more analysed products to be statistically significant predictors of attraction. The identity of nine of the compounds was verified using authentic samples, while one was not commercially available. Field trials used tracking tunnels to present compounds at seven different concentrations from 10,000 ppm to 0.01 ppm. Inked cards inside tracking tunnels were used to quantify visitations using species tracking marks, with the presence of rat tracks on inked cards scored to provide a tracking rate. Five compounds outperformed peanut butter while eight individual semiochemical-based lures each statistically outperformed peanut butter. Nearly half of all confirmed visits to compounds were with lures presented at 0.1 and 0.01 ppm. A trend of increasing tracking rates with decreasing lure concentration was identified for aggregated compound data. Our results suggest a number of compounds have the potential for onward development as synthetic attractants for rats. Further, the results support our integrated chemical image and response-guided approach that statistically associated behavioural responses to a range of products with the volatile compounds in those products. This approach has the potential to identify semiochemical compounds, either allelochemical or pheromone, for use as olfactory lures for managing and monitoring a range of vertebrate pest species.

One hundred men, living in three villages in a remote region of the Eastern Highlands of Papua New Guinea were asked to judge the attractiveness of photographs of women who had undergone micrograft surgery to reduce their waist-to-hip ratios (WHRs). Micrograft surgery involves harvesting adipose tissue from the waist and reshaping the buttocks to produce a low WHR and an 'hourglass' female figure. Men consistently chose postoperative photographs as being more attractive than preop erative photographs of the same women. Some women gained, and some lost weight, postoperatively, with resultant changes in body mass index (BMI). However, changes in BMI were not related to men's judgments of attractiveness. These results show that the hourglass female figure is rated as attractive by men living in a remote, indigenous community, and that when controlling for BMI, WHR plays a crucial role in their attractiveness judgments. Am J Phys Anthropol 141:620-625, 2010. [c] 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc. KEY WORDS female attractiveness; human evolution; sexual selection DOI 10.1002/ajpa.21181

The article discusses the issue of invasive species denialism and the accusations that have been made against scientists and practitioners in the field of invasion biology. The authors argue that these accusations lack evidence and rigor, and that they are leading to unscientific discourse and a decline in public trust in science. They also highlight the potential negative consequences for those accused of denialism, including damage to their reputation and employment opportunities. The authors call for a more considered and circumspect approach to accusations of invasive species denialism, aligning scientific work with the values of cooperation, open-mindedness, evidence, and honesty. [Extracted from the article]

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2009.01.017 Byline: Wayne L. Linklater (a)(b), Elissa Z. Cameron (a)(c) Abstract: The function of dispersal is best examined in species, such as horses, Equus caballus, where breeding groups' ranges may overlap entirely such that social and spatial dispersal are decoupled. We hypothesized that mares disperse from natal groups to avoid incest, but avoid dispersing spatially, thus revealing the importance of philopatric advantage. We examined dispersal by 97 mares among 26 breeding groups occupying 46km.sup.2 of the Kaimanawa Ranges, New Zealand, from August 1994 to March 1997. We recorded group membership, location and habitat, mare body condition and reproductive state, and 201 temporary and 135 permanent dispersal events. All mares emigrated from natal groups during a 2-3-year process beginning with sexual maturity in yearlings. Dispersal rates peaked seasonally with sexual receptivity and were highest in 1-2 year olds. Group fidelity was established around 3-4 years of age and mares older than 5 years rarely dispersed. Dispersal and the stability of group membership were not explained by characteristics of breeding groups or their home ranges, or the body condition and maternal status of mares. Groups into which mares immigrated, however, were predicted by their proximity to a mare's previous group. Mares dispersed socially, but favoured philopatry despite competition so long as incest could be avoided. The apparent contradiction whereby females disperse socially but remain spatially philopatric is possible because dispersal to breed can occur without dispersing in space which means that dispersal in space is not obligatory for inbreeding avoidance. Author Affiliation: (a) Ecology - Institute of Natural Resources, Massey University, New Zealand (b) Centre for Biodiversity and Restoration Ecology, School of Biological Sciences, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand (c) Mammal Research Institute, Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Pretoria, South Africa Article History: Received 30 June 2008; Revised 4 August 2008; Accepted 12 January 2009 Article Note: (miscellaneous) MS. number: 08-00418R

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2008.07.009 Byline: Elissa Z. Cameron, Wayne L. Linklater, Kevin J. Stafford, Edward O. Minot Abstract: Play behaviour is widespread in mammals, but benefits to play have been difficult to demonstrate. Physical training is one of the many proposed hypotheses, suggesting that males and females should play differently, that increased maternal investment should lead to increases in play, and that increases in play should result in physical advantages. In a population of feral horses, Equus caballus, males and females did not differ in their play behaviour except that males initiated more of their play bouts than females. Maternal condition influenced play behaviour only in males, with sons of mothers in good condition playing more. However, when we controlled for maternal effects by comparing a son and a daughter of the same mother, daughters played more when their mother was in poor condition and sons played more when their mother was in good condition. Mothers of foals that played more lost more condition. Therefore, the difference in play behaviour could not be explained by offspring sex or maternal condition alone, but play behaviour mirrored variation in maternal investment. In addition, those individuals that played more survived better and had better body condition as yearlings despite weaning earlier. Since increased activity has been linked to enhanced musculoskeletal development in domestic horses, we suggest that play provides a link between increased maternal investment, increased body condition and future reproductive success in feral horses, and probably in other species. Author Affiliation: (a) Mammal Research Institute, Department of Zoology & Entomology, University of Pretoria, South Africa (a ) Ecology Group, Institute of Natural Resources, Massey University, New Zealand (a ) Institute of Veterinary, Animal & Biomedical Sciences, Massey University, New Zealand Article History: Received 9 November 2007; Revised 11 January 2008; Accepted 2 July 2008 Article Note: (miscellaneous) MS. number: 9581R

Maternal investment in sons and daughters in feral horses was studied.

Wildlife-based tourism poses opportunities and challenges for species conservation. Minimizing potential negative impacts of tourism is critical to ensure business and conservation enterprises can coexist. In north-western Namibia tourism is used as a conservation tool for the Critically Endangered black rhinoceros Diceros bicornis. However, black rhinoceroses are susceptible to human disturbance and may become displaced by tourist activities, which threatens not only the security and health of the rhinoceros population but also the sustainability of the business. We examined areas avoided by black rhinoceroses to understand how they respond to the type and extent of tourism development, and to evaluate management alternatives. We used spatial data on use of water sources by rhinoceroses to create a series of a priori candidate models that described the negative influences of tourist activities on rhinoceros habitat use. A model selection approach strongly supported a cumulative zones of influence model comprised of a 6 km buffer around the airstrip combined with a 1 km buffer around roads used daily. We compared alternative management scenarios using the best-performing model and found that an optimal road-use policy combined with airstrip relocation could minimize the total area avoided by the black rhinoceros to 7.1% and loss of high quality habitat to 20.7%. Under the worst-case scenario the area avoided and loss of high quality habitat were 153 and 85% greater, respectively, than under the scenario with optimal management. Our findings provide a novel framework and a practical, policy-relevant decision support tool to improve the contribution of tourism to wildlife conservation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pro-environmental behaviors (PEBs) may be associated with a personal relationship with nature. We conducted a quasi-experiment with 423 residents who had or had not actively participated in a tree-planting scheme and lived in 20 neighborhoods that differ in their greenness level. We tested whether exposure to nature (specified by the amount of vegetation cover in residents' neighborhoods) and/or past PEB (specified by tree-planting participation) was associated with residents' PEB and whether key psychological constructs would mediate these relationships. Structural equation mediation models revealed that the level of neighborhood vegetation and involvement in the planting scheme explained 46% of the variance in PEB, with connection to nature, the use of nature for psychological restoration, and environmental attitudes mediating the relationships. Connection to nature was more strongly associated with engagement in PEB than the use of nature for psychological restoration and environmental attitudes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]