| frugivorous bats maintain functional habitat connectivity in agricultural landscapes but rely strongly on natural forest fragments. | anthropogenic changes in land use threaten biodiversity and ecosystem functioning by the conversion of natural habitat into agricultural mosaic landscapes, often with drastic consequences for the associated fauna. the first step in the development of efficient conservation plans is to understand movement of animals through complex habitat mosaics. therefore, we studied ranging behavior and habitat use in dermanura watsoni (phyllostomidae), a frugivorous bat species that is a valuable seed disper ... | 2015 | 25830222 |
| social calls produced within and near the roost in two species of tent-making bats, dermanura watsoni and ectophylla alba. | social animals regularly face the problem of relocating conspecifics when separated. communication is one of the most important mechanisms facilitating group formation and cohesion. known as contact calls, signals exchanged between conspecifics that permit group maintenance are widespread across many taxa. foliage-roosting bats are an excellent model system for studying the evolution of contact calling, as there are opportunities to compare closely related species that exhibit major differences ... | 2013 | 23637893 |
| cheating on the mutualistic contract: nutritional gain through seed predation in the frugivorous bat chiroderma villosum (phyllostomidae). | most frugivorous bats are efficient seed dispersers, as they typically do not damage seeds and transport them over long distances. in contrast, bats of the phyllostomid genus chiroderma cheat fig trees by acting more as seed predators than as seed dispersers. the bats initially separate seeds from fruit pulp in the mouth. after extracting the juice from the fruit pulp, they thoroughly chew the seeds and spit out small seed fragments in a pellet. consequently, the faeces contain almost no viable ... | 2015 | 25833133 |