Activity strategy and pattern of the Siberian jerboa (Orientallactaga sibirica) in the Alxa desert region, China

Abstract

Rodents exhibit seasonal changes in their activity patterns as an essential survival strategy. We studied the activity patterns and strategies of the Siberian jerboa (Orientallactaga sibirica) in the Alxa desert region to better understand the habitats and behavioural ecology of xeric rodents. We conducted an experiment using three plots to monitor the duration, time, and frequency of the active period of the Siberian jerboa using infrared cameras in the Alxa field workstation, Inner Mongolia, China in 2017. The relationships between the activity time and frequency, biological factors (perceived predation risk, food resources, and species composition), and abiotic factors (temperature, air moisture, wind speed) were analysed using Redundancy Analysis (RDA). Our results showed that: (1) relative humidity mainly affected activities in the springtime; temperature, relative humidity and interspecific competition mainly affected activities in the summertime; relative humidity and perceived predation risk mainly influenced activities in the autumn. (2) The activity pattern of the Siberian jerboa altered depending on the season. The activity of the Siberian jerboa was found to be bimodal in spring and summer, and was trimodal in autumn. The activity time and frequency in autumn were significantly lower than the spring. (3) Animals possess the ability to integrate disparate sources of information about danger to optimize energy gain. The jerboa adapted different responses to predation risks and competition in different seasons according to the demand for food resources.

Influence of grazing on the activity pattern and temporal niche of two dominant rodent species in Alxa desert

“…Moreover, food was sufficiently abundant to meet rodents' energy needs and there was no need to let itself under the risk of predation. Desert rodents maximize their foraging efficiency by reducing the time spent outside their burrows to reduce water loss (Hut et al, 2012) and predation risk, which facilitates their adaptation to arid desert environments (Ji et al, 2021). Due to the higher predation risk from low vegetation coverage for quadrupedal gerbils in the grazing area (Pereira et al, 2012), the activity duration of Midday gerbil in the grazing area in summer was significantly lower than that in the grazing exclusion area.…”