Diet Determined by Next Generation Sequencing Reveals Pest Consumption and Opportunistic Foraging by Bats in Macadamia Orchards in South Africa

Taylor, Peter J.; Matamba, Emmanuel; Steyn, Jacobus Nicolaas; Nangammbi, Tshifhiwa; Mendoza, Marie Lisandra Zepeda; Bohmann, Kristine

doi:10.3161/15081109acc2017.19.2.003

Cited by 25 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…The study of Weier et al 2018, conducted in the same study area, shows that bat activity nearly doubled in the high season and increased with Hemipteran abundance. This also supports the suggestion that insectivorous bat species track outbreaks of insect pests (to the macadamia growers) such as certain stinkbug (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae) species (Taylor et al, 2013;Taylor et al, 2017;McCracken et al, 2012). We therefore suggest that colonization of bat houses in and around macadamia orchards was highest in times of high prey availability ( Figure 4).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 73%

“…The climate in the study area is subtropical with approximately 1000 mm of annual rainfall (Taylor et al, 2017). Dominant land use types other than macadamia are pecan, avocado and banana orchards as well as pine and Eucalyptus spp.…”

Section: Study Area and Bat House Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The loss of roost sites caused by land use changes is one of the major drivers of this decline (Mickleburgh et al, 2002;Park, 2015) and there is a particular lack of knowledge regarding roost site preferences of African bat species (Monadjem et al, 2009;Monadjem et al, 2010a;Taylor, 2000). Given accelerating land use change from natural to agricultural landscapes in the developing world and an assumed decline of South African bat populations (Voigt & Kingston, 2016), proactive management of these populations is indispensable to sustain the ecosystem services they provide (Cumming et al, 2014;Taylor et al, 2017;Tuttle et al, 2013). Proactive management of bat populations requires filling knowledge gaps about roost site preferences for African bat species, in particular around intensive agricultural systems (Monadjem et al, 2009;Park, 2015;Taylor, 2000).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Peer Review #3 of "The use of bat houses as day roosts in macadamia orchards, South Africa (v0.2)"

Burgar¹

2019

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The loss of roost sites is one of the major drivers of the worldwide decline in bat populations and roost site preferences, either natural or artificially provided, are not well known for African bat species specifically. In this study we focus on the preference for different artificial roost sites by insectivorous bats in macadamia orchards in northern South Africa. From June 2016 to July 2017 we monitored 31 bat houses, mounted on poles in six macadamia orchards, for presence of bats or other occupants. Twenty-one multichambered bat houses of three different designs were erected in sets of three. Additionally, five Rocket boxes, four bat houses in sets of two (painted black and white) and one colony bat house were erected. Bats were counted and visually identified to family or species level. From December 2016 to the end of March 2017 iButtons were installed to record and analyze temperature variation within one set of three bat houses. We related the occupancy of bat houses to the different types of houses and the environmental variables: distance to water, altitude and height of the bat houses above the ground. Overall bat house occupancy was significantly higher in the central bat house, in the set of three, and the black bat house, in the set of two. Mean temperatures differed between houses in the set of three with the central bat house having a significantly higher mean temperature than the houses flanking it. Our study might confirm previous assumptions that the microclimate of bat houses appears to be an important factor influencing occupancy. In conclusion, from the different bat houses tested in this study the designs we assume the warmest and best insulated attracted the most bats. Further research is needed on the preferred microclimate of different bat species, co-habitation within bat houses and the potential importance of altitude and distance to water. Our study provided little variation in both altitude and the distance to water.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 73%

Section: Study Area and Bat House Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Peer Review #3 of "The use of bat houses as day roosts in macadamia orchards, South Africa (v0.2)"

Burgar¹

2019

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“…Bats are known to be active in South African macadamia orchards and to feed on major insect pest species, like the green vegetable bug (Taylor, Bohmann, et al, ; Taylor et al, ). Other data confirm the consumption of several more insect pests by bats (Weier et al, ), namely the macadamia nut borer, the two‐spotted stink bug and the litchi moth Cryptophlebia peltastica .…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ecosystem services and disservices by birds, bats and monkeys change with macadamia landscape heterogeneity

Linden

Graß

Joubert

et al. 2019

Journal of Applied Ecology

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1. The relative importance of ecosystem services and disservices can change with landscape structure in a poorly understood way.2. We compare the impact of biocontrol, provided by bats and birds, with that of crop raiding by vervet monkeys on yield in South African macadamia orchards.Insectivorous bats and birds are known to feed on macadamia pest insect species, like the macadamia nut borer or the green vegetable bug. Vervet monkeys move into the orchards during the day to feed on premature macadamia nuts. Bats, birds and monkeys benefit from patches of natural vegetation adjacent to orchards. With exclusion experiments (four treatments: day, night, day and night, control) we quantified the relative importance of biocontrol and crop raiding on yield, comparing two different landscape settings of the orchards, a natural and a human-modified. 4. Crop raiding occurred only close to natural vegetation and caused yield losses of about 26%. Biocontrol by bats and birds was higher near natural vegetation, but still significant in human-modified landscapes, at up to 530 m distance to forest patches. Prevented biocontrol through the exclusion of bats and birds resulted in yield losses of up to 60%.5. Effects of biocontrol by bats and birds (USD ~5,000 ha/year) were economically more important than the losses of crop raiding (USD ~1,600 ha/year). As both are linked to the vicinity of forest patches, the removal of natural vegetation to limit monkey abundances would also limit biocontrol service provision. Synthesis and applications.This study highlights the high economic benefits of biocontrol by bats and birds, which outweighed negative impacts through yield losses caused by crop raiding monkeys. Management practices to prevent crop damage, such as guarding, excluding vertebrates or removal of adjacent natural vegetation, would also limit access for bats and birds and the great economic benefits provided by their biocontrol. Ecosystem services by bats and birds can be promoted by the exposure of artificial roost and nest sites, but research into species-specific preferences is needed. The education of farmers is crucial, as many are unaware 2070 | Journal of Applied Ecology LINDEN Et aL.

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“…The DNA metabarcoding of bat faecal pellets can offer valuable insights into the dietary preferences of bats and their potential role as pest suppressors (Bohmann et al, 2014;Swift et al, 2018). Recent diet analyses of multiple bat species have detected a wide range of arthropods in bat populations (Galan et al, 2017) including several economically important pest species (Taylor et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bats as potential suppressors of multiple agricultural pests: A case study from Madagascar

Kemp

López‐Baucells

Rocha

et al. 2019

Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment

101

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The conversion of natural habitats to agriculture is one of the main drivers of biotic change. Madagascar is no exception and land-use change, mostly driven by slash-and-burn agriculture, is impacting the island's exceptional biodiversity. Although most species are negatively affected by agricultural expansion, some, such as synanthropic bats, are capable of exploring newly available resources and benefit from man-made agricultural ecosystems. As bats are known predators of agricultural pests it seems possible that Malagasy bats may be preferentially foraging within agricultural areas and therefore provide important pest suppression services. To investigate the potential role of bats as pest suppressors, we conducted acoustic surveys of insectivorous bats in and around Ranomafana National Park, Madagascar, during November and December 2015. We surveyed five landcover types: irrigated rice, hillside rice, secondary vegetation, forest fragment and continuous forest. 9,569 bat passes from a regional assemblage of 19 species were recorded. In parallel, we collected faeces from the six most common bat species to detect insect pest species in their diet using DNA metabarcoding. Total bat activity was higher over rice fields when compared to forest and bats belonging to the open space and edge space sonotypes were the most benefited by the conversion of forest to hillside and irrigated rice. Two economically important rice pests were detected in the faecal samples collected-the paddy swarming armyworm Spodoptera mauritia was detected in Mops leucogaster samples while the grass webworm Herpetogramma licarsisalis was detected from Mormopterus jugularis and Miniopterus majori samples. Other crops pests detected included the sugarcane cicada Yanga guttulata, the macadamia nut-borer Thaumatotibia batrachopa and the sober tabby Ericeia inangulata (a pest of citrus fruits). Samples from all bat species also contained reads from important insect disease vectors. In light of our results we argue that Malagasy insectivorous bats have the potential to suppress agricultural pests. It is important to retain and maximise Malagasy Benstead, 2005). However, despite its high level of endemism and species diversity, Madagascar's forests continue to face one of the highest rates of conversion in the world with approximately 1% of the island's forest cover being cleared each year (Rasolofoson et al., 2015; Eklund et al., 2016; Vieilledent et al., 2018). While most Malagasy biodiversity is adversely affected by agriculture-driven habitat modification, some 'winner' species benefit from habitat modification and increase their abundance in agricultural areas. Several of these are insectivorous birds (Martin et al., 2012; Rocha et al., 2015) and bats (López-Baucells et al., 2017b) that through the suppression of agricultural pests can provide valuable ecosystem services to local populations (Karp and Daily 2014; Maas et al. 2015). Rice (Oryza spp.) is one of the most important staple food crops worldwide (Muthayya et al., 2014). It is the main...

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Diet Determined by Next Generation Sequencing Reveals Pest Consumption and Opportunistic Foraging by Bats in Macadamia Orchards in South Africa

Cited by 25 publications

References 46 publications

Peer Review #3 of "The use of bat houses as day roosts in macadamia orchards, South Africa (v0.2)"

Peer Review #3 of "The use of bat houses as day roosts in macadamia orchards, South Africa (v0.2)"

Ecosystem services and disservices by birds, bats and monkeys change with macadamia landscape heterogeneity

Bats as potential suppressors of multiple agricultural pests: A case study from Madagascar

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