Land cover influences dietary specialization of insectivorous bats globally

Maine, Josiah J.; Boyles, Justin G.

doi:10.1007/s13364-015-0243-z

Cited by 7 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 67 publications

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“…Insectivorous bats are important top-down regulators of arthropod populations 3 – 5 . Many bat species are characterized by a wide range of dietary preferences and can adapt to various land cover types, which enables them to adjust to changes in food availability throughout the year 6 , 7 . As highly mobile generalist consumers, insectivorous bats contribute to stabilizing and connecting local food webs in their ecosystem 8 , 9 .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Winter diet of bats in working forests of the southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain

Perea,

Meinecke,

Larsen-Gray

et al. 2024

Sci Rep

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Working forests comprise a large proportion of forested landscapes in the southeastern United States and are important to the conservation of bats, which rely on forests for roosting and foraging. While relationships between bat ecology and forest management are well studied during summer, winter bat ecology remains understudied. Hence, we aimed to identify the diet composition of overwintering bats, compare the composition of prey consumed by bat species, and determine the potential role of forest bats as pest controllers in working forest landscapes of the southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain. During January to March 2021–2022, we captured 264 bats of eight species. We used DNA metabarcoding to obtain diet composition from 126 individuals of seven bat species identifying 22 orders and 174 families of arthropod prey. Although Coleoptera, Diptera, and Lepidoptera were the most consumed orders, we found that bats had a generalist diet but with significant differences among some species. We also documented the consumption of multiple insect pests (e.g., Rhyacionia frustrana) and disease vectors (e.g., Culex spp). Our results provide important information regarding the winter diet of bats in the southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain and their potential role in controlling economically relevant pest species and disease vectors.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Winter diet of bats in working forests of the southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain

Perea,

Meinecke,

Larsen-Gray

et al. 2024

Sci Rep

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“…Although interspecific differences in strategies for resource use may have important implications in conservation, ecological traits (such as specialization) have been hardly explored to assess vulnerability of marine fishes (Dulvy et al , ). A positive association between narrow dietary niche breadth and extinction risk has been found in some taxa, such as bats (Boyles & Storm, ; Maine & Boyles, ) and butterflies (Franzén et al , ). In this way, we revealed that skate species with narrow dietary niche breadth tend to be the most vulnerable ones.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ecological specialization is associated with high conservation concern in skates (Chondrichthyes, Rajiformes)

Barbini

Lucifora

Sabadin

et al. 2019

Animal Conservation

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Identifying the ecological traits of threatened species may help to identify species vulnerable to exploitation and habitat loss, predict future declines in abundance and provide the basis for their conservation. We assessed the relationship of dietary and habitat niche breadth on conservation status of skate species (Chondrichthyes, Rajiformes). We hypothesized that skate species with a narrow niche breadth have a higher conservation concern than skate species with wide niche breadth. Conservation status (IUCN), dietary and depth range data on 57 skate species were collected. Generalized linear mixed effect models were fitted with taxonomic level (genera nested within family) included as a random effect term in each model. In each model, body size of skate species was included as a variable because this life history trait is a known predictor of vulnerability. A model selection approach to test the level of support for alternative models was applied. Our results support the hypothesis that a narrow niche breadth is related to high vulnerability. Skate species with high probability of being of conservation concern have a narrow trophic niche breadth and a large body size. We conclude that dietary niche breadth together with body size may be an important trait to identify potentially vulnerable skate species. Conservation biology faces the challenge of identifying what species are vulnerable to anthropogenic stressors and to determine why this is so. The predictive value of our results may allow to know a priori which species should receive prioritary attention.

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“…Bats’ response to insect prey outbreaks is well known (Fukui et al, 2006; Mata et al, 2016; Krauel et al, 2017) and the array of moth species that bats eat include many damaging pests of crops. Moths detrimental to cotton, rice or corn are consumed readily by bats (McCracken et al, 2012; Puig-Montserrat et al, 2015; Maine & Boyles, 2015) and damage to crops increases where hunting by bats is precluded (Maas et al, 2016; Boyles et al, 2013). Further, a substantial part of the bat community is able to incorporate suddenly available prey into their diet (Russo, Bosso & Ancillotto, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bats from different foraging guilds prey upon the pine processionary moth

Garin

Aihartza

Goiti

et al. 2019

PeerJ

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Outbreaks of the processionary moth Thaumetopoea pityocampa (Denis & Schiffermüller, 1775), a forest pest from the Palearctic, are thought to induce a behavioral response of bats, but up to now the moth has been seldom identified as bats’ prey. Studies on bat diets suggest moths with cyclical outbreaks attract a wide array of bat species from different foraging guilds. We test whether bats feed upon T. pityocampa in the Iberian Peninsula irrespective of the predator’s ecological and morphological features. We found that seven out of ten bat species belonging to different foraging guilds contained T. pityocampa DNA in their faeces and no difference was found in the foraging frequency among foraging guilds. A different size of the typical prey or the lack of fondness for moths can explain the absence of the pest in some bat species. Moreover, the intraspecific foraging frequency of T. pityocampa also changed with the sampling site likely representing differential availability of the moth. Lack of information on flight and dispersal behavior or the tympanate nature of the adult moth complicates understanding how different foraging guilds of bats prey upon the same prey. Our data suggests that T. pityocampa is a remarkable food source for many thousands of individual bats in the study area and we anticipate that more bats besides the species studied here are consuming this moth.

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Land cover influences dietary specialization of insectivorous bats globally

Cited by 7 publications

References 67 publications

Winter diet of bats in working forests of the southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain

Winter diet of bats in working forests of the southeastern U.S. Coastal Plain

Ecological specialization is associated with high conservation concern in skates (Chondrichthyes, Rajiformes)

Bats from different foraging guilds prey upon the pine processionary moth

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