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Age-sex analysis for the diet of Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus roxellana) in Shennongjia National Nature Reserve, China

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Abstract

Age-sex differences in diet have been reported in many nonhuman primates, and body size, reproductive costs, and growth are three mutually non-exclusive factors often proposed to explain such differences. Smaller animals tend to feed on high quality foods (high in protein/energy) more often than larger animals due to their higher metabolic requirements per body weight. Animals of different sizes tend to use different substrate levels, leading to dietary differences if food resources are unevenly distributed along substrate levels. Adult females and juveniles experience additional metabolic requirements for reproduction and growth, respectively, and tend to feed on high quality foods more frequently than adult males. We conducted an age-sex analysis for the diet of Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus roxellana) in Shennongjia, China. In spite of general age-sex similarities, we found that adult males ate herbs more frequently than juveniles and adult females, most likely because they were more terrestrial. As predicted, juveniles ate high quality foods (young leaves, fruits, seeds, and buds) more frequently, and meanwhile ate low quality foods (barks and lichens) less frequently than adult males across the study year or in some seasons when these food types were eaten. However, we found high similarities in diet between adult females and adult males. The most likely reason was that the low diversity of food sources and strong phenological synchrony did not allow adult females to select foods based on quality to cope with their higher metabolic constraints compared to adult males. Surprisingly, the only sex difference in diet except herbs was that adult females ate lichens more frequently in autumn. One plausible reason was that lactating females experienced their highest metabolic requirements in the middle period of infant care (autumn), and had to disproportionately increase the intake of lichens due to the limited availability of plant foods.

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Acknowledgments

We greatly appreciate the financial support from the National Science and Technology Support Program of China (2013BAD03B03), and the Special Grant for Research and Education Integration (KJRH2015-016) and the Scientific Research Grant for Youth Scholars from the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences. We are grateful to professor Amanda H. Korstjens and anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments on the manuscript, especially on the statistical approach. We also thank the field assistants, Jinglong Yang, Yiguo Sun, and Yongfa Li for helping us collect behavioral data in the field.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Life Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, People’s Republic of China

    Xuecong Liu & Fang Li

  2. Administrative Bureau of Shennongjia National Nature Reserve, Shennongjia, 442421, Hubei, People’s Republic of China

    Jun Jiang & Xiaoju Wang

  3. Key Laboratory of Animal Ecology and Conservation Biology, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 1 Beichen West Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing, 100101, People’s Republic of China

    Yiming Li

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  1. Xuecong Liu
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Correspondence to Yiming Li.

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Liu, X., Li, F., Jiang, J. et al. Age-sex analysis for the diet of Sichuan snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus roxellana) in Shennongjia National Nature Reserve, China. Primates 57, 479–487 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10329-016-0535-1

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