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Do Forest Composition and Fruit Availability Predict Demographic Differences Among Groups of Territorial Owl Monkeys (Aotus azarai)?

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Abstract

Small-scale ecological variables, such as forest structure and resource availability, may affect primate groups at the scale of group home ranges, thereby influencing group demography and life-history traits. We evaluated the complete territories of 4 groups of owl monkeys (Aotus azarai), measuring and identifying all trees and lianas with a diameter at breast height ≥10 cm (n = 7485). We aimed to determine all food sources available to each of those groups and to relate food availability to group demographics. For analyses, we considered the core areas of the home range separately from the 80% home range. Our results showed that groups occupy territories that differ in size, species evenness, stem density, and food species’ stem abundances. The territories differed in the availability of fruits, flowers, and leaves, and most fruit sources were unevenly distributed in space. Differences among territories were more pronounced for the whole range than they were for the core areas. Despite marked differences among territories in structure and food availability, the number of births and age at natal dispersal were quite similar, but 1 group had a consistently lower group size. Our results suggest that owl monkey groups occupy territories of different structure and composition and food availability, yet ones that contain similar quantities of, mostly, dry season fruit sources. We propose that groups inhabit these territories to overcome food shortages safely during limiting periods, specifically the dry season, in this markedly seasonal forest. The occupancy and defense of territories with strict boundaries may therefore be associated with food resources available during limiting seasons that may be the ones influencing life history patterns and demographics.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the field assistants, students, and volunteers who collected demographic data during 1998–2009. Many thanks also go to Victor Dávalos, Marcelo Rotundo, and Argentinean field assistants who helped examining 16.25 ha of forest for structure and composition. We appreciate the continuous support of the managers of Estancia Guaycolec. The Ministerio de la Producción, Subsecretaría de Ecología and Recursos Naturales from Formosa Province, and the Dirección de Fauna Silvestre de la Nación Argentina authorized and sponsored the field research reported here. We thank Maren Huck for her useful comments on earlier versions of the manuscript. We also thank Dr. Joanna Setchell and 2 anonymous reviewers for thoroughly reading our manuscript and providing useful suggestions that considerably improved our manuscript. Eduardo Fernandez-Duque gratefully acknowledges continuing financial support from the Wenner-Gren Foundation, the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation, the National Geographic Society, and the National Science Foundation (BCS-0621020).

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  1. Griëtte van der Heide

    Present address: , 15801 Chase Hill Boulevard, Apartment 515, San Antonio, TX, 78256, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fundación ECO, Formosa, Argentina

    Griëtte van der Heide, Eduardo Fernandez-Duque & Cecilia Paola Juárez

  2. CECOAL-Conicet, Corrientes, Argentina

    Eduardo Fernandez-Duque

  3. Department of Anthropology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Eduardo Fernandez-Duque

  4. Universidad Nacional del Nordeste, Corrientes, Argentina

    David Iriart

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van der Heide, G., Fernandez-Duque, E., Iriart, D. et al. Do Forest Composition and Fruit Availability Predict Demographic Differences Among Groups of Territorial Owl Monkeys (Aotus azarai)?. Int J Primatol 33, 184–207 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10764-011-9560-5

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