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Patch depletion behavior differs between sympatric folivorous primates

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Abstract

Food competition in group-living animals is commonly accepted as a critical determinant of foraging strategies and social organization. Here we examine food patch depletion behavior in a leaf-eating (folivorous) primate, the guereza (Colobus guereza). Snaith and Chapman (2005) studied the sympatric folivorous red colobus (Procolobus rufomitratus), which shares many food resources with the guereza. They determined that red colobus deplete the patches (feeding trees) they use, while we found contrary evidence for guerezas using the same methods. We found that the time guerezas spent feeding in a patch was affected by neither tree size, an indicator of food abundance, nor the size of the feeding group, an indicator of feeding competition. For their principal food item (young leaves), intake rate remained constant and coincided with a decrease in the distance moved to find food within a patch, implying that guerezas do not deplete patches. This points to a fundamental difference in the use of food by guerezas and red colobus, which may be linked to the large difference in their group sizes and/or to a disparity in their digestive physiologies. However, further analyses revealed that the number of feeders within a patch did not affect patch depletion patterns in either species, leaving the potential for a physiological basis as the most plausible explanation. Our research highlights the need for a more critical examination of folivorous primate feeding ecology and social behavior, as all folivorous primates are typically lumped into a single category in socioecological models, which may account for conflicting evidence in the literature.

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Acknowledgments

Permission to conduct this research was given by the National Council for Science and Technology, the Uganda Wildlife Authority, and the McGill University Animal Care Committee. Funding for the research was provided by Canada Research Chairs Program, McGill School of Environment, Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and Hunter College. We would like to extend special thanks to the field assistants of the Kibale Fish and Monkey Project, particularly Peter Tuhairwe and Richard Karamagi. We thank Dr. Lauren Chapman, Dr. Eric Delson, Ria Ghai, Aerin Jacob, Dr. Scott McGraw, Catrina MacKenzie, and particularly Dr. Tara Harris for helpful comments or discussions related to this manuscript. We would like to extend special thanks to Dr. Tamaini Snaith, who generously shared her data on red colobus feeding behavior.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, McGill University, 1205 Docteur Penfield, Montreal, QC, H3A 1B1, Canada

    Kaia J. Tombak & Andrea J. Reid

  2. Department of Anthropology, and McGill School of Environment, McGill University, 855 Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal, H3A 2T7, Canada

    Colin A. Chapman & Rafael Reyna-Hurtado

  3. Wildlife Conservation Society, 2300 Southern Boulevard, Bronx, NY, 10460, USA

    Colin A. Chapman & Rafael Reyna-Hurtado

  4. Department of Anthropology, Hunter College of the City University of New York, New York, NY, 10065, USA

    Jessica M. Rothman & Caley A. Johnson

  5. Department of Anthropology, The Graduate Center, City University of New York, New York, NY, 10016, USA

    Jessica M. Rothman & Caley A. Johnson

  6. New York Consortium in Evolutionary Primatology, New York, NY, 10024, USA

    Jessica M. Rothman & Caley A. Johnson

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  1. Kaia J. Tombak
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Correspondence to Colin A. Chapman.

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K.J. Tombak and A.J. Reid contributed equally to this study.

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Tombak, K.J., Reid, A.J., Chapman, C.A. et al. Patch depletion behavior differs between sympatric folivorous primates. Primates 53, 57–64 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10329-011-0274-2

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