Dietary Flexibility and Feeding Strategies of Eulemur: A Comparison with Propithecus
Dietary Flexibility and Feeding Strategies of Eulemur: A Comparison with Propithecus
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Eulemur 的饮食灵活性和饲养策略：与 Propithecus 的比较
DOI：
10.1007/s10764-015-9877-6
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发表时间：
2016
影响因子：
2.5
通讯作者：
Giuseppe Donati
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Hiroki Sato;Luca Santini;Erik R. Patel;Marco Campera;Nayuta Yamashita;Ian C. Colquhoun;Giuseppe Donati
尽管马达加斯加的栖息地种类繁多，但欧勒穆尔已经成功地繁衍了岛上大多数森林栖息地。虽然Eulemuri的高饮食灵活性通常被认为是其进化成功的驱动力之一，但其他行为证据表明，Eulemura改变饮食的能力有限。为了阐明Eulemur的摄食策略，我们比较了该属种群与另一个分布广泛的狐猴分类群Propithecus之间的饮食灵活性。我们假设Eulemura会比Propithecus表现出更大的饮食灵活性，Propithecus有专门处理叶子的消化系统，并且生活在干燥森林中的Eulemur会季节性地从水果转向其他食物。为了验证这些假设，我们对10个种群进行了系统发育最小二乘分析，以评估环境变量和体重对它们饮食灵活性的贡献，同时控制系统发育相关。Eulemura严重依赖水果，在一年中主要食物没有太大变化。Eulemurus同等地消耗树叶和水果，并在不同季节表现出相当的灵活性。因此，与我们的预测相反，纤维消化的解剖学专门化提高了Propithecus的饮食灵活性。在属内水平上，我们发现相似的生态地理变异；体重较大的两个属的种群消耗更多的水果。正如我们预测的那样，更干燥的Eulemurin栖息地更频繁地将饮食从水果转向替代食物。为了弥补较低的饮食灵活性，Eulemurm大多采用了一种能量喂养策略，通过增加能量消耗来获得零星分布的水果资源。
Despite the great variety of habitats in Madagascar,Eulemurhas successfully populated most forested habitats on the island. Although the high dietary flexibility ofEulemuris often credited as one of the drivers of its evolutionary success, other behavioral evidence suggests a limited capacity for dietary switching. To shed light on the feeding strategies ofEulemur, we compared the dietary flexibility between populations of this genus with that of another widespread lemur taxon,Propithecus. We hypothesized thatEulemurwould show greater dietary flexibility thanPropithecus, which has a digestive system specialized for folivory, and thatEulemurliving in dry forests would switch its diet from fruit to other food seasonally. To examine these hypotheses, we performed a phylogenetic least-squares analysis on 10 populations ofEulemurand 7 ofPropithecusto assess the contribution of environmental variables and body mass on their dietary flexibility while controlling for phylogenetic relatedness.Eulemurrelied heavily on fruit and did not show large variations in primary food over the year.Propithecusconsumed leaves and fruits equally and exhibited considerable flexibility across seasons. Therefore, in contrast to our predictions, the anatomical specialization for fiber digestion heightens dietary flexibility inPropithecus. At the intrageneric level, we found similar ecogeographic variation; populations of both genera with heavier body mass consumed more fruit. As we predicted,Eulemurin drier habitats switched the diet from fruit to alternative food more frequently. To compensate for low dietary flexibility,Eulemurmostly adopts a power-feeding strategy by which it increases energy expenditure to acquire patchily distributed fruit resources.