Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Food Availability, Predation Risk and Antipredator Behavior in Blue Monkeys

动物必须获得食物，避免捕食者生存。 然而，经验证据表明，食物获取和捕食者回避是相互冲突的需求。减少捕食风险的行为也可能减少食物摄入量。 因此，动物必须制定策略，使它们能够平衡进食的需要和避免被吃掉的需要。 一个可能在很大程度上决定个体如何应对捕食风险的因素是食物供应。 当食物稀缺时，个体可能会接受更大的捕食风险，并尽量减少对反捕食行为的投资，如果这样做，他们能够增加他们的食物摄入量。 食物可获得性对灵长类动物反捕食行为的作用还没有得到很好的研究。 本项目通过调查肯尼亚卡卡梅加森林中三个习惯性蓝猴（Cercopithecus mitis）群体中食物丰富度和分布对反捕食行为的影响，解决了灵长类动物研究中的这一空白。 通过研究食物供应和捕食风险如何相互作用并影响蓝猴的行为，该项目将有助于更好地了解灵长类动物的行为生态学在几个方面。 首先，确定捕食风险影响蓝猴觅食模式的程度将导致更好和更现实的理解觅食行为。 其次，本项目的数据将阐明捕食风险和食物可获得性如何相互作用，以确定一个群体内食物竞争的数量。 第三，研究个体群体成员如何平衡食物获取和捕食者回避的竞争需求，将有助于了解社会性的成本和收益如何在群体成员中分配，这反过来又将有助于了解捕食与食物竞争在群体生活灵长类动物中的相对重要性。 在肯尼亚当地助手的帮助下，将在12个月的时间内收集成年人和青少年反捕食者行为的观察数据。 将这些数据与食物丰富度和分布的生态数据进行比较，以确定蓝猴是否减少反捕食行为，并在食物供应不足的时期接受更高的捕食风险。 回放实验，其中从冠鹰，蓝猴的捕食者，发声播放到一个蓝猴组，将每个月进行评估的影响，模拟捕食者的存在觅食和antipredator行为组成员之间。 该项目将为卡卡梅加森林正在进行的长期蓝猴行为研究提供额外数据。 它将产生更广泛的影响，使卡卡梅加环境教育项目这一地方基层组织受益，方法是雇用当地的自然保护主义者和自然主义者，向环境教育教师和学生提供教育材料，同时协助共同参与者的专业发展。

Animals must obtain food and avoid predators to survive. However, empirical evidence suggests that food acquisition and predator avoidance are conflicting demands. Behaviors that reduce predation risk may also reduce food intake. Therefore, animals must develop strategies that allow them to balance the need to eat with the need to avoid being eaten. One factor that may largely determine how individuals respond to predation risk is food availability. When food is scarce, individuals may accept greater predation risk and minimize investment in antipredator behaviors if by so doing they are able to increase their food intake. The role of food availability on antipredator behaviors in primates has not been well studied. This project addresses this gap in primate research by investigating the influence of food abundance and distribution on antipredator behaviors in three habituated groups of blue monkeys (Cercopithecus mitis) in Kakamega Forest, Kenya. By examining how food availability and predation risk interact and influence behavior in blue monkeys, this project will contribute to a better understanding of primate behavioral ecology in several ways. First, determining the extent to which predation risk influences foraging patterns in blue monkeys will lead to a better and more realistic understanding of foraging behavior. Second, data from this project will elucidate how predation risk and food availability interact to determine the amount of competition for food within a group. Third, studying how individual group members balance the competing demands of food acquisition and predator avoidance will provide insights into how the costs and benefits of sociality are distributed among group members, and this in turn will provide insights into the relative importance of predation vs. food competition in group-living primates. With the help of local Kenyan assistants, observational data on antipredator behaviors in adults and juveniles will be collected over a 12- month period. These data will be compared with ecological data on food abundance and distribution to determine whether blue monkeys reduce antipredator behaviors and accept a higher risk of predation in periods of low food availability. Playback experiments, in which vocalizations from crowned hawk eagles, a predator of blue monkeys, are played to a blue monkey group, will be conducted each month to assess the effects of simulated predator presence on foraging and antipredator behavior among group members. This project will provide additional data to an on-going, long-term study of blue monkey behavior at Kakamega Forest. It will have the broader impacts of benefiting the Kakamega Environmental Education Project, a local, grassroots organization, by employing local conservationists and naturalists and providing educational materials to environmental education teachers and students while assisting in the professional development of the co-PI.