Animal Physiology, Institute for Neurobiology, University of Tübingen Tübingen, Germany.
Front Physiol. 2013 Jul 3;4:164. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2013.00164. eCollection 2013.
Throughout evolution the foraging and echolocation behaviors as well as the motor systems of bats have been adapted to the tasks they have to perform while searching and acquiring food. When bats exploit the same class of environmental resources in a similar way, they perform comparable tasks and thus share similar adaptations independent of their phylogeny. Species with similar adaptations are assigned to guilds or functional groups. Habitat type and foraging mode mainly determine the foraging tasks and thus the adaptations of bats. Therefore, we use habitat type and foraging mode to define seven guilds. The habitat types open, edge and narrow space are defined according to the bats' echolocation behavior in relation to the distance between bat and background or food item and background. Bats foraging in the aerial, trawling, flutter detecting, or active gleaning mode use only echolocation to acquire their food. When foraging in the passive gleaning mode bats do not use echolocation but rely on sensory cues from the food item to find it. Bat communities often comprise large numbers of species with a high diversity in foraging areas, foraging modes, and diets. The assignment of species living under similar constraints into guilds identifies patterns of community structure and helps to understand the factors that underlie the organization of highly diverse bat communities. Bat species from different guilds do not compete for food as they differ in their foraging behavior and in the environmental resources they use. However, sympatric living species belonging to the same guild often exploit the same class of resources. To avoid competition they should differ in their niche dimensions. The fine grain structure of bat communities below the rather coarse classification into guilds is determined by mechanisms that result in niche partitioning.
在进化过程中，蝙蝠的觅食和回声定位行为以及运动系统已经适应了它们在搜索和获取食物时必须执行的任务。当蝙蝠以相似的方式利用同一类环境资源时，它们执行相似的任务，因此，无论它们的系统发育如何，它们都具有相似的适应性。具有相似适应性的物种被分配到类群或功能群中。栖息地类型和觅食方式主要决定蝙蝠的觅食任务和适应。因此，我们使用栖息地类型和觅食方式来定义七个类群。开放、边缘和狭窄空间等栖息地类型是根据蝙蝠的回声定位行为与蝙蝠和背景或食物和背景之间的距离来定义的。在空中、拖网、扑动探测或主动觅食模式中觅食的蝙蝠只用回声定位来获取食物。当以被动觅食模式觅食时，蝙蝠不使用回声定位，而是依靠食物的感官线索来找到食物。蝙蝠群落通常包含大量具有高多样性的物种，它们在觅食区、觅食方式和饮食方面存在多样性。将生活在相似约束下的物种分配到类群中，可以确定群落结构的模式，并有助于理解导致高度多样化的蝙蝠群落组织的因素。来自不同类群的蝙蝠物种不会因为它们的觅食行为和它们使用的环境资源不同而争夺食物。然而，属于同一类群的同域生活物种通常会利用同一类资源。为了避免竞争，它们的生态位维度应该不同。在类群相当粗糙的分类之下，蝙蝠群落的细粒结构是由导致生态位分割的机制决定的。
