Attila Bende, Richárd László, Sándor Faragó, István Fekete
Abstract. Morphometric characteristics of Eurasian woodcock collected during spring hunting (March) in Hungary between 2010 and 2014 were investigated to evaluate the accuracy of methods for determining the sex of live birds. We analysed the size dimorphism of biometric traits by sex, age, and sex and age, with sex determination (n = 13,226) performed by destructive methods and age determination based on wing examination (n = 8,905). Using the minimal important differences (MID) method, we demonstrated that, during spring migration, adult females have significantly greater mass and bill length than juvenile females and adult males, as well as a significant difference in body length compared to juvenile females. No biologically relevant differences were demonstrated between the sexes or age classes for other morphometric parameters. Conditional inference trees were applied to test whether body size parameters could be used to separate the age and sex of individuals. Based on posterior probabilities (55.4%), we suggest that biometric parameters no longer provide a sufficiently reliable method to separate age classes during the spring migration. Separation of sexes showed the best results for adult birds, with bill length (85.4%) and body mass (85.2%) proving the best predictors. The inclusion of additional morphometric variables (tarsus, tail, body and wing length) in the model did not increase the reliability of sex segregation, confirming the results obtained using MID, i.e. that there is no statistically verifiable biologically relevant difference between adult male and female birds for these parameters. A methodological innovation in this study was using MIDs for comparisons to determine biological thresholds for differences, the procedure helping to exclude Type I errors and determine biological significance.
{"title":"An investigation into the possibilities of sex and age determination of Eurasian woodcock (Scolopax rusticola L.) based on biometric parameters, using conditional inference trees and minimal important differences","authors":"Attila Bende, Richárd László, Sándor Faragó, István Fekete","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23068","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23068","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Morphometric characteristics of Eurasian woodcock collected during spring hunting (March) in Hungary between 2010 and 2014 were investigated to evaluate the accuracy of methods for determining the sex of live birds. We analysed the size dimorphism of biometric traits by sex, age, and sex and age, with sex determination (n = 13,226) performed by destructive methods and age determination based on wing examination (n = 8,905). Using the minimal important differences (MID) method, we demonstrated that, during spring migration, adult females have significantly greater mass and bill length than juvenile females and adult males, as well as a significant difference in body length compared to juvenile females. No biologically relevant differences were demonstrated between the sexes or age classes for other morphometric parameters. Conditional inference trees were applied to test whether body size parameters could be used to separate the age and sex of individuals. Based on posterior probabilities (55.4%), we suggest that biometric parameters no longer provide a sufficiently reliable method to separate age classes during the spring migration. Separation of sexes showed the best results for adult birds, with bill length (85.4%) and body mass (85.2%) proving the best predictors. The inclusion of additional morphometric variables (tarsus, tail, body and wing length) in the model did not increase the reliability of sex segregation, confirming the results obtained using MID, i.e. that there is no statistically verifiable biologically relevant difference between adult male and female birds for these parameters. A methodological innovation in this study was using MIDs for comparisons to determine biological thresholds for differences, the procedure helping to exclude Type I errors and determine biological significance.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"8 4","pages":"23068.1 - 15"},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2023-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138971922","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Prof. Gordon Howard Copp (1956-2023)","authors":"Milan Peňáz, Kevin F. Roche, Pavel Jurajda","doi":"10.25225/jvb.e2301","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.e2301","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"1 1","pages":"E2301.1 - 2"},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2023-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139227490","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Miloš Macholán, Kristina Daniszová, Petra Hamplová, Kateřina Janotová, Martin Kašný, Ondřej Mikula, Barbora Vošlajerová Bímová, Zuzana Hiadlovská
Chemical communication is important for many social mammals. Scent-related gene clusters have undergone extraordinary expansion in some species, such as the house mouse (Mus musculus). One such family encodes major urinary proteins (MUPs). MUPs can provide recipients with complex information about the signaller and potentially serve as honest signals of social rank. In this study, we examined the development of overall MUP production in two mouse subspecies in the context of establishing their social hierarchy during the critical period between weaning and 100 days of age. We used fraternal pairs as simple social units, where dominant/subordinate ranks were naturally established between two brothers raised together, to test the hypothesis that dominant males of both taxa excrete higher amounts of MUPs in their urine than subordinates. The results were compared to data on ontogeny of steroid hormone levels gathered in the same individuals during an earlier experiment. Higher MUP levels in dominant males were only corroborated in one subspecies (domesticus), whereas musculus males revealed similar MUP quantities irrespective of rank. These results are consistent with the notion that these closely related taxa adopted different strategies for establishing social hierarchy.
{"title":"Rank-dependency of major urinary protein excretion in two house mouse subspecies","authors":"Miloš Macholán, Kristina Daniszová, Petra Hamplová, Kateřina Janotová, Martin Kašný, Ondřej Mikula, Barbora Vošlajerová Bímová, Zuzana Hiadlovská","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23046","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23046","url":null,"abstract":"Chemical communication is important for many social mammals. Scent-related gene clusters have undergone extraordinary expansion in some species, such as the house mouse (Mus musculus). One such family encodes major urinary proteins (MUPs). MUPs can provide recipients with complex information about the signaller and potentially serve as honest signals of social rank. In this study, we examined the development of overall MUP production in two mouse subspecies in the context of establishing their social hierarchy during the critical period between weaning and 100 days of age. We used fraternal pairs as simple social units, where dominant/subordinate ranks were naturally established between two brothers raised together, to test the hypothesis that dominant males of both taxa excrete higher amounts of MUPs in their urine than subordinates. The results were compared to data on ontogeny of steroid hormone levels gathered in the same individuals during an earlier experiment. Higher MUP levels in dominant males were only corroborated in one subspecies (domesticus), whereas musculus males revealed similar MUP quantities irrespective of rank. These results are consistent with the notion that these closely related taxa adopted different strategies for establishing social hierarchy.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"54 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135855265","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
A new species of the luminous roughy fish genus Aulotrachichthys is described based on a single specimen collected from northeastern Taiwan. It differs from congeners in having the combination of characters: striated area on the caudal peduncle extending posteriorly, slightly beyond the middle point on the caudal peduncle, its length 66.7% caudal-peduncle length; a black vertical line on caudal-fin base; an overall dark-brown colouration, with isthmus, chest, abdominal scutes black; dorsal-fin elements V, 13; anal-fin spines III; lateral-scale rows 58; rakers on first gill arch 6 + 1 + 14 = 21; a rather slender body; a proportionally shorter trunk, distance between dorsal- and anal-fin origins, dorsal fin, pectoral fin, forehead, snout, and both upper and lower jaws; a proportionally longer preanal length, postdorsal length, and striated area. DNA-barcoding analysis revealed that the new species is clustered within Aulotrachichthys prosthemius and A. latus. The identity of A. sajademalensis from Taiwan is also discussed after a thorough examination of the fish collections of Taiwan. Moreover, we suggested that A. sajademalensis is restricted to the western Indian Ocean and, therefore, should be excluded from the ichthyofauna of Taiwan due to the misidentification of literature records and the absence of voucher specimens.
{"title":"A new luminous roughy fish from northeastern Taiwan, with comments on congeners in Taiwan (Trachichthyidae: Aulotrachichthys)","authors":"Yo Su, Hsuan-Ching Ho, Hsiu-Chin Lin","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23060","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23060","url":null,"abstract":"A new species of the luminous roughy fish genus Aulotrachichthys is described based on a single specimen collected from northeastern Taiwan. It differs from congeners in having the combination of characters: striated area on the caudal peduncle extending posteriorly, slightly beyond the middle point on the caudal peduncle, its length 66.7% caudal-peduncle length; a black vertical line on caudal-fin base; an overall dark-brown colouration, with isthmus, chest, abdominal scutes black; dorsal-fin elements V, 13; anal-fin spines III; lateral-scale rows 58; rakers on first gill arch 6 + 1 + 14 = 21; a rather slender body; a proportionally shorter trunk, distance between dorsal- and anal-fin origins, dorsal fin, pectoral fin, forehead, snout, and both upper and lower jaws; a proportionally longer preanal length, postdorsal length, and striated area. DNA-barcoding analysis revealed that the new species is clustered within Aulotrachichthys prosthemius and A. latus. The identity of A. sajademalensis from Taiwan is also discussed after a thorough examination of the fish collections of Taiwan. Moreover, we suggested that A. sajademalensis is restricted to the western Indian Ocean and, therefore, should be excluded from the ichthyofauna of Taiwan due to the misidentification of literature records and the absence of voucher specimens.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"31 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136154799","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
A cryptic loach species of the genus Misgurnus (Cypriniformes: Cobitidae) has been reported as Misgurnus sp. Type I sensu Okada et al. (2017) (hereafter called Type I loach) from the Japanese Archipelago, in addition to the common nominal species, M. anguillicaudatus (hereafter called Type II loach). Although both species co-exist in the Naka-ikemi Wetland, Fukui Prefecture, their mechanism of reproductive isolation is unknown. Differences in sexual dimorphism might reflect differences in reproductive behaviour that contribute to reproductive isolation between the two species. We investigated the morphological characteristics of the two loach species at two sympatric sites and observed several morphological differences. Type I differ from Type II loaches in the following morphological traits and sexual dimorphisms: in males, generally less developed lamina circularis, shorter anal fins, and lack of a pair of raised ridges in the anterior portion of the body side; in females, lack of spawning scars on the body side. These morphological differences between the two sympatric loaches may reflect differences in their spawning behaviour. Furthermore, it may represent one of the factors responsible for reproductive isolation between the two species.
据报道，除了常见的名义种M. anguillicaudatus(以下称为II型泥鳅)外，日本群岛还发现了Misgurnus属的一种隐蔽泥鳅(鲤形目:双鱼科)，称为Misgurnus sp. Type I sensu Okada等人(2017)(以下称为I型泥鳅)。虽然这两个物种共存于福井县Naka-ikemi湿地，但它们的生殖隔离机制尚不清楚。两性二态性的差异可能反映了导致两个物种之间生殖隔离的生殖行为的差异。研究了两种泥鳅在两个同域地点的形态特征，并观察到形态上的一些差异。I型泥鳅与II型泥鳅在以下形态特征和两性二态性上有所不同:雄性泥鳅的圆片一般发育较差，肛鳍较短，身体前部缺少一对隆起的脊;雌性身上没有产卵的疤痕。这两种同域泥鳅的形态差异可能反映了它们产卵行为的差异。此外，这可能是导致两个物种之间生殖隔离的因素之一。
{"title":"Differences in sexual morphological dimorphisms between two loach species of the genus Misgurnus (Cypriniformes: Cobitidae) in the River Shono system, Fukui Prefecture, Japan","authors":"Yuki Yashima, Ryuya Okada, Tadao Kitagawa","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23035","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23035","url":null,"abstract":"A cryptic loach species of the genus Misgurnus (Cypriniformes: Cobitidae) has been reported as Misgurnus sp. Type I sensu Okada et al. (2017) (hereafter called Type I loach) from the Japanese Archipelago, in addition to the common nominal species, M. anguillicaudatus (hereafter called Type II loach). Although both species co-exist in the Naka-ikemi Wetland, Fukui Prefecture, their mechanism of reproductive isolation is unknown. Differences in sexual dimorphism might reflect differences in reproductive behaviour that contribute to reproductive isolation between the two species. We investigated the morphological characteristics of the two loach species at two sympatric sites and observed several morphological differences. Type I differ from Type II loaches in the following morphological traits and sexual dimorphisms: in males, generally less developed lamina circularis, shorter anal fins, and lack of a pair of raised ridges in the anterior portion of the body side; in females, lack of spawning scars on the body side. These morphological differences between the two sympatric loaches may reflect differences in their spawning behaviour. Furthermore, it may represent one of the factors responsible for reproductive isolation between the two species.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"26 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135885873","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Tereza Otčenášková, Romana Stopková, Aneta Zemanová, Kristýna Míčková, Karel Harant, Oldřich Tomášek, Tomáš Albrecht, Pavel Stopka
Abstract. Spermatozoa are the most variable cells across animal taxa. Phylogeny, speciation and postcopulatory sexual selection are typical factors that explain the sperm morphology variation in animals, and now these differences can also be explored on the level of genomic and proteomic differentiation. However, in non-model organisms, it is often difficult to employ these techniques because genomes are not yet available for most animal species, particularly for free-living songbirds (Passeriformes). Here, we employed label-free proteomics to generate proteomes in the zebra finch, a songbird species with an annotated genome and five wild-living songbirds representing five families within the Passerida clade, all with poorly known genomes. The results show that protein mapping of the new passerine proteomes to the zebra finch genome was successful, thus yielding highly similar protein identifications and a sufficient number of unique peptides in all the studied proteomes. Interestingly, while passerine sperm proteomes only partially reflect phylogenetic relationships between passerine families, midpiece length correlates with at least 59 proteins enriched in mitochondrial metabolism. Similar sperm proteomes seem to have evolved convergently across passerine lineages, potentially due to varying levels of sperm competition and marked variation in sperm sizes.
{"title":"Comparative sperm proteomics in selected passerine birds reflects sperm morphology and mitochondrial metabolism","authors":"Tereza Otčenášková, Romana Stopková, Aneta Zemanová, Kristýna Míčková, Karel Harant, Oldřich Tomášek, Tomáš Albrecht, Pavel Stopka","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23045","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23045","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Spermatozoa are the most variable cells across animal taxa. Phylogeny, speciation and postcopulatory sexual selection are typical factors that explain the sperm morphology variation in animals, and now these differences can also be explored on the level of genomic and proteomic differentiation. However, in non-model organisms, it is often difficult to employ these techniques because genomes are not yet available for most animal species, particularly for free-living songbirds (Passeriformes). Here, we employed label-free proteomics to generate proteomes in the zebra finch, a songbird species with an annotated genome and five wild-living songbirds representing five families within the Passerida clade, all with poorly known genomes. The results show that protein mapping of the new passerine proteomes to the zebra finch genome was successful, thus yielding highly similar protein identifications and a sufficient number of unique peptides in all the studied proteomes. Interestingly, while passerine sperm proteomes only partially reflect phylogenetic relationships between passerine families, midpiece length correlates with at least 59 proteins enriched in mitochondrial metabolism. Similar sperm proteomes seem to have evolved convergently across passerine lineages, potentially due to varying levels of sperm competition and marked variation in sperm sizes.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"57 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135982554","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Michal Přibyl, Richard Kabelka, Patrik M. Hanzlík, Peter Mikulíček, Nicolas Folk, Vladimír Piaček, Jiří Pikula, Vojtech Baláž1
Ophidiomyces ophidiicola (Oo) is a snake fungal pathogen that causes ophidiomycosis. The disease manifests as dermatomycosis and/or systemic mycosis, and can be fatal. It occurs in free-ranging snakes in Asia, Europe and the USA and has also been demonstrated in captive snakes. We tested for the presence of Oo in free-ranging snake populations in the Czech and Slovak Republics (n = 420) between 2019 and 2022, focusing mainly on grass snakes (Natrix natrix) and dice snakes (Natrix tessellata), as well as various captive exotic species (n = 207). After collecting skin swabs, we tested for Oo using the qPCR method. We confirmed fragmented occurrence of Oo in the Czech Republic (total prevalence 15%) and recorded Oo in the Slovak Republic for the first time (total prevalence 33.9%). The highest prevalence was observed in N. tessellata (20.2%), which appears to be the most susceptible species. The pathogen was not detected in captive snakes.
{"title":"Ophidiomyces ophidiicola in free-ranging and captive snakes in the Czech and Slovak Republics","authors":"Michal Přibyl, Richard Kabelka, Patrik M. Hanzlík, Peter Mikulíček, Nicolas Folk, Vladimír Piaček, Jiří Pikula, Vojtech Baláž1","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23050","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23050","url":null,"abstract":"Ophidiomyces ophidiicola (Oo) is a snake fungal pathogen that causes ophidiomycosis. The disease manifests as dermatomycosis and/or systemic mycosis, and can be fatal. It occurs in free-ranging snakes in Asia, Europe and the USA and has also been demonstrated in captive snakes. We tested for the presence of Oo in free-ranging snake populations in the Czech and Slovak Republics (n = 420) between 2019 and 2022, focusing mainly on grass snakes (Natrix natrix) and dice snakes (Natrix tessellata), as well as various captive exotic species (n = 207). After collecting skin swabs, we tested for Oo using the qPCR method. We confirmed fragmented occurrence of Oo in the Czech Republic (total prevalence 15%) and recorded Oo in the Slovak Republic for the first time (total prevalence 33.9%). The highest prevalence was observed in N. tessellata (20.2%), which appears to be the most susceptible species. The pathogen was not detected in captive snakes.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"49 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135939078","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Leticia J. Musese, Charles J. Kilawe, Amani S. Kitegile
The Eastern Arc Mountain forests are recognised as the richest forests for biodiversity in mainland Africa. However, disturbances, particularly invasive plants, reduce the capacity of these forests to support biodiversity conservation. This study investigated the abundance, diversity and community composition of rodents in forest sites invaded and uninvaded by Maesopsis eminii in Amani Forest Nature Reserve. Rodents were captured through a capture-mark-recapture technique, using 300 Sherman traps located in invaded and uninvaded forest sites. A generalised linear model was applied to assess patterns in rodent community composition in invaded and uninvaded forest sites. The results indicated that the invasion by M. eminii significantly affected the diversity and assemblage of rodents, thereby reducing the abundance of Beamys hindei, suggesting that the invasive tree may be affecting various aspects of the rodent's life. We recommend taking measures to prevent the spread of M. eminii into the uninvaded parts of the reserve to reduce habitat loss for rodents and other native species.
{"title":"The abundance and diversity of rodents in forest sites invaded and uninvaded by Maesopsis eminii trees in Amani Nature Reserve, Tanzania","authors":"Leticia J. Musese, Charles J. Kilawe, Amani S. Kitegile","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23006","url":null,"abstract":"The Eastern Arc Mountain forests are recognised as the richest forests for biodiversity in mainland Africa. However, disturbances, particularly invasive plants, reduce the capacity of these forests to support biodiversity conservation. This study investigated the abundance, diversity and community composition of rodents in forest sites invaded and uninvaded by Maesopsis eminii in Amani Forest Nature Reserve. Rodents were captured through a capture-mark-recapture technique, using 300 Sherman traps located in invaded and uninvaded forest sites. A generalised linear model was applied to assess patterns in rodent community composition in invaded and uninvaded forest sites. The results indicated that the invasion by M. eminii significantly affected the diversity and assemblage of rodents, thereby reducing the abundance of Beamys hindei, suggesting that the invasive tree may be affecting various aspects of the rodent's life. We recommend taking measures to prevent the spread of M. eminii into the uninvaded parts of the reserve to reduce habitat loss for rodents and other native species.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"31 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136362995","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract. Flying squirrels have important roles in ecosystems, dispersing seeds and spores. However, flying squirrel species, which strongly depend on old mature forests, have declined in abundance due to the logging of mature forests. Guidelines for the conservation of flying squirrels have been developed, but it is vital to have an accurate understanding of their ecology to revise the guidelines to be more effective. The Japanese flying squirrel (Pteromys momonga, JFS), endangered in wide areas of Japan, is one of the flying squirrel species for which the least ecological information is available. This paper reviews individual reports and attempts to address knowledge gaps in JFS ecology to facilitate conservation strategies. Of particular importance is the fact that JFS uses planted Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica) for nesting, gliding and winter forage, and JFS habitat may be strongly influenced by human activities such as forestry. Plantations are regularly logged, so management of plantations needs to be implemented with attention to the JFS habitat. It was also found that some ecological information necessary to develop guidelines for conservation, such as diet, gliding ability, and home-range size, is missing. Clarification of these issues is an important task.
{"title":"Ecology and conservation of the Japanese flying squirrel Pteromys momonga","authors":"Kei K. Suzuki","doi":"10.25225/jvb.23054","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.23054","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract. Flying squirrels have important roles in ecosystems, dispersing seeds and spores. However, flying squirrel species, which strongly depend on old mature forests, have declined in abundance due to the logging of mature forests. Guidelines for the conservation of flying squirrels have been developed, but it is vital to have an accurate understanding of their ecology to revise the guidelines to be more effective. The Japanese flying squirrel (Pteromys momonga, JFS), endangered in wide areas of Japan, is one of the flying squirrel species for which the least ecological information is available. This paper reviews individual reports and attempts to address knowledge gaps in JFS ecology to facilitate conservation strategies. Of particular importance is the fact that JFS uses planted Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica) for nesting, gliding and winter forage, and JFS habitat may be strongly influenced by human activities such as forestry. Plantations are regularly logged, so management of plantations needs to be implemented with attention to the JFS habitat. It was also found that some ecological information necessary to develop guidelines for conservation, such as diet, gliding ability, and home-range size, is missing. Clarification of these issues is an important task.","PeriodicalId":48482,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Vertebrate Biology","volume":"72 1","pages":"23054.1 - 15"},"PeriodicalIF":1.5,"publicationDate":"2023-09-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49589657","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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