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Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
Nest grouping patterns of bonobos (Pan paniscus) in relation to fruit availability in a forest-savannah mosaic
PLoS ONE, Volume 9, No. 4, Article e93742, Year 2014
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Description
A topic of major interest in socio-ecology is the comparison of chimpanzees and bonobos' grouping patterns. Numerous studies have highlighted the impact of social and environmental factors on the different evolution in group cohesion seen in these sister species. We are still lacking, however, key information about bonobo social traits across their habitat range, in order to make accurate inter-species comparisons. In this study we investigated bonobo social cohesiveness at nesting sites depending on fruit availability in the forest-savannah mosaic of western Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), a bonobo habitat which has received little attention from researchers and is characterized by high food resource variation within years. We collected data on two bonobo communities. Nest counts at nesting sites were used as a proxy for night grouping patterns and were analysed with regard to fruit availability. We also modelled bonobo population density at the site in order to investigate yearly variation. We found that one community density varied across the three years of surveys, suggesting that this bonobo community has significant variability in use of its home range. This finding highlights the importance of forest connectivity, a likely prerequisite for the ability of bonobos to adapt their ranging patterns to fruit availability changes. We found no influence of overall fruit availability on bonobo cohesiveness. Only fruit availability at the nesting sites showed a positive influence, indicating that bonobos favour food 'hot spots' as sleeping sites. Our findings have confirmed the results obtained from previous studies carried out in the dense tropical forests of DRC. Nevertheless, in order to clarify the impact of environmental variability on bonobo social cohesiveness, we will need to make direct observations of the apes in the forest-savannah mosaic as well as make comparisons across the entirety of the bonobos' range using systematic methodology. © 2014 Serckx et al.
Authors & Co-Authors
Serckx, Adeline
Belgium, Liege
Université de Liège
Belgium, Brussels
Koninklijk Belgisch Instituut Voor Natuurwetenschappen
Democratic Republic Congo, Kinshasa
Universite de Kinshasa
Germany, Leipzig
Max-planck-institut Für Evolutionäre Anthropologie
Huynen, Marie Claude
Belgium, Liege
Université de Liège
Bastin, Jean François
Democratic Republic Congo, Kinshasa
Universite de Kinshasa
Belgium, Brussels
Université Libre de Bruxelles
Belgium, Liege
Université de Liège
Hambuckers, A.
Belgium, Liege
Université de Liège
Beudels-Jamar, Roseline Claire
Belgium, Brussels
Koninklijk Belgisch Instituut Voor Natuurwetenschappen
Vimond, Marie
Belgium, Liege
Université de Liège
Raynaud, Emilien
Belgium, Liege
Université de Liège
Kühl, Hjalmar S.
Germany, Leipzig
Max-planck-institut Für Evolutionäre Anthropologie
Germany, Leipzig
German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research Idiv Halle-jena-leipzig
Statistics
Citations: 80
Authors: 8
Affiliations: 6
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1371/journal.pone.0093742
e-ISSN:
19326203
Research Areas
Food Security
Study Design
Cross Sectional Study
Study Locations
Congo