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Black-and-white snub-nosed monkey (Rhinopithecus bieti) feeding behavior in a degraded forest fragment: clues to a stressed population

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Abstract

Rapid global deforestation has forced many of the world’s primates to live in fragmented habitats, making the understanding of their behavioral responses to degraded and fragmented habitats a key challenge for their future protection and management. The black-and-white snub-nosed monkey (Rhinopithecus bieti) is an endangered species endemic to southwest China. The forest habitat ranges from near-continuous to fragmented. In this study, we investigated the activity budget and diet of a R. bieti population that live in an isolated and degraded habitat patch at Mt. Lasha in Yunnan Province, near the current southern limit of the species. We used our data along with data from six other sites in more-continuous habitats across its range to model factors that predict stress, including feeding effort and time feeding on lichens against potential predictive parameters. Models showed feeding effort across all sites increased with increasing altitude and latitude, and with decreasing food species diversity. There was also a strong positive relationship between feeding effort and time feeding lichens. The Mt. Lasha R. bieti population exploited a total of 36 food species, spending 80.2% of feeding time feeding on lichens, Bryoria spp. and Usnea longissima. These figures are more comparable to those living in the north than those living in the mid- and southern part of the species’ range. Given the models for feeding effort and time feeding on lichens, the unexpectedly high time spend feeding on lichens and feeding effort relative to latitude and elevation are suggestive of a stressed population at Mt. Lasha.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (31560118, 31260149, 31160422, and 31260159), Collaborative Innovation Center for Biodiversity and Conservation in the Three Parallel Rivers Region of China, Committee for Research and Exploration, National Geographic Society (Grant #7962-05), TNC “Conservation Ecology of Yunnan Snub-nosed Monkey (Rhinopithecus bieti) at Two Geographic Extremes of Species Range”, and the PhD Foundation from Dali University (KYBS201509), and Program for Backup Talents of Young Academic and Technical Leaders in Yunnan Province (2015HB047). We would be unable to accomplish this research without the help of our assistants and forest guards Zhang Jin-fu. We thank the Yunling Nature Reserve for permitting us to work there, and kindly offering necessary help during our study. Great thanks to Prof. Michael A. Huffman and an anonymous reviewer for useful suggestions that improved the manuscript.

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Author notes

  1. Zhi-Pang Huang and Matthew B. Scott have contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Eastern-Himalaya Biodiversity Research, Dali University, Dali, 671003, Yunnan, China

    Zhi-Pang Huang, Matthew B. Scott, Yan-Peng Li, Guo-Peng Ren & Wen Xiao

  2. Forestry Faculty, Southwest Forestry University, Kunming, 650224, Yunnan, China

    Zhi-Pang Huang & Liang-Wei Cui

  3. Scion (New Zealand Forest Research Institute), Ilam, Christchurch, 8041, New Zealand

    Matthew B. Scott

  4. Central South University of Forestry and Technology, Changsha, 410004, Hunan, China

    Zuo-Fu Xiang

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  1. Zhi-Pang Huang
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Correspondence to Liang-Wei Cui or Wen Xiao.

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Huang, ZP., Scott, M.B., Li, YP. et al. Black-and-white snub-nosed monkey (Rhinopithecus bieti) feeding behavior in a degraded forest fragment: clues to a stressed population. Primates 58, 517–524 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10329-017-0618-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10329-017-0618-7

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