Soultan Alaaeldin, Nagy Abdullah, Attum Omar
Department of Ecology Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences Uppsala Sweden.
Department of Zoology Al-Azhar University in Cairo Cairo Egypt.
Ecol Evol. 2021 Sep 22;11(20):13661-13667. doi: 10.1002/ece3.8141. eCollection 2021 Oct.
Dorcas gazelles are believed to use middens to mark their territories and transmit information. Given the commitment to maintaining a midden, it is believed that middens are not placed randomly. We examined how the habitat (tree height and maximum canopy) and anthropogenic disturbance (camel and human presence) influenced the selection of midden sites by Dorcas gazelles in South Sinai, Egypt. Our results showed that Dorcas gazelles did not place middens at larger trees, while favoring relatively smaller trees and shrubs where the anthropogenic disturbance and perceived hunting risk are less. Our results, in light of the previous findings, suggest that selection of midden sites is species context-dependent behavior. In areas with less anthropogenic disturbance and hunting, Dorcas gazelles have been shown to select the largest trees of the same species as midden sites. In contract, in our study site with high anthropogenic disturbance and no protection from hunting, gazelles did not utilize the presumably optimum landmarks for midden sites. Our study showed that Dorcas gazelles instead utilized smaller trees and some shrubs that are less conspicuous and presumably less effective as advertisement sites, but safer.
多卡羚羊被认为利用粪堆来标记领地并传递信息。鉴于维持粪堆的行为，人们认为粪堆的放置并非随意。我们研究了栖息地（树高和最大树冠）和人为干扰（骆驼和人类的存在）如何影响埃及西奈半岛南部多卡羚羊对粪堆地点的选择。我们的结果表明，多卡羚羊不会在较大的树上放置粪堆，而是更喜欢相对较小的树木和灌木，因为这些地方人为干扰和感知到的狩猎风险较小。根据先前的研究结果，我们的结果表明，粪堆地点的选择是一种依赖物种背景的行为。在人为干扰和狩猎较少的地区，多卡羚羊会选择同物种中最大的树木作为粪堆地点。相反，在我们的研究地点，人为干扰严重且没有狩猎保护，羚羊没有利用那些可能是粪堆地点的最佳地标。我们的研究表明，多卡羚羊反而利用了较小的树木和一些不太显眼的灌木，这些地方作为广告地点可能效果较差，但更安全。
