Bogdanović Neda, Hertel Anne G, Zedrosser Andreas, Paunović Milan, Plećaš Milan, Ćirović Duško
Faculty of Biology University of Belgrade Belgrade Serbia.
Behavioral Ecology Department of Biology Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich Planegg-Martinsried Germany.
Ecol Evol. 2021 Oct 28;11(22):15972-15983. doi: 10.1002/ece3.8267. eCollection 2021 Nov.
Most animals concentrate their movement into certain hours of the day depending on drivers such as photoperiod, ambient temperature, inter- or intraspecific competition, and predation risk. The main activity periods of many mammal species, especially in human-dominated landscapes, are commonly set at dusk, dawn, and during nighttime hours. Large carnivores, such as brown bears, often display great flexibility in diel movement patterns throughout their range, and even within populations, striking between individual differences in movement have been demonstrated. Here, we evaluated how seasonality and reproductive class affected diel movement patterns of brown bears of the Dinaric-Pindos and Carpathian bear populations in Serbia. We analyzed the movement distances and general probability of movement of 13 brown bears (8 males and 5 females) equipped with GPS collars and monitored over 1-3 years. Our analyses revealed that movement distances and probability of bear movement differed between seasons (mating versus hyperphagia) and reproductive classes. Adult males, solitary females, and subadult males showed a crepuscular movement pattern. Compared with other reproductive classes, females with offspring were moving significantly less during crepuscular hours and during the night, particularly during the mating season, suggesting temporal niche partitioning among different reproductive classes. Adult males, solitary females, and in particular subadult males traveled greater hourly distances during the mating season in May-June than the hyperphagia in July-October. Subadult males significantly decreased their movement from the mating season to hyperphagia, whereas females with offspring exhibited an opposite pattern with almost doubling their movement from the mating to hyperphagia season. Our results provide insights into how seasonality and reproductive class drive intrapopulation differences in movement distances and probability of movement in a recovering, to date little studied, brown bear population in southeastern Europe.
大多数动物会根据光周期、环境温度、种间或种内竞争以及捕食风险等驱动因素，将其活动集中在一天中的特定时段。许多哺乳动物物种的主要活动期，尤其是在人类主导的景观中，通常设定在黄昏、黎明和夜间时段。大型食肉动物，如棕熊，在其整个分布范围内的昼夜活动模式通常具有很大的灵活性，甚至在种群内部，个体之间的活动差异也十分显著。在此，我们评估了季节性和繁殖类别如何影响塞尔维亚迪纳拉 - 品都斯山脉和喀尔巴阡山脉棕熊种群的昼夜活动模式。我们分析了13只佩戴GPS项圈并在1至3年时间内受到监测的棕熊（8只雄性和5只雌性）的移动距离和移动的总体概率。我们的分析表明，熊的移动距离和移动概率在不同季节（交配期与暴食期）和繁殖类别之间存在差异。成年雄性、独居雌性和亚成年雄性呈现出晨昏活动模式。与其他繁殖类别相比，有后代的雌性在晨昏时段和夜间的移动明显较少，尤其是在交配季节，这表明不同繁殖类别之间存在时间生态位划分。成年雄性、独居雌性，特别是亚成年雄性在5 - 6月的交配季节比7 - 10月的暴食期每小时移动距离更远。亚成年雄性从交配季节到暴食期移动显著减少，而有后代的雌性则呈现相反模式，从交配季节到暴食期移动几乎翻倍。我们的研究结果为季节性和繁殖类别如何驱动欧洲东南部一个目前研究较少且正在恢复的棕熊种群内部在移动距离和移动概率上的差异提供了见解。
