Daily Activity Patterns and Co-Occurrence of Duikers Revealed by an Intensive Camera Trap Survey across Central African Rainforests

• Published in: Animals (Basel) Vol. 10; no. 12; p. 2200
• Main Authors: Houngbégnon, Fructueux G. A., Cornelis, Daniel, Vermeulen, Cédric, Sonké, Bonaventure, Ntie, Stephan, Fayolle, Adeline, Fonteyn, Davy, Lhoest, Simon, Evrard, Quentin, Yapi, Fabrice, Sandrin, François, Vanegas, Liliana, Ayaya, Idriss, Hardy, Clément, Le Bel, Sebastien, Doucet, Jean-Louis
• Format: Journal Article Web Resource
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 24.11.2020; MDPI
• Subjects: Agricultural sciences; Animal biology; Animals; Biodiversity and Ecology; camera traps; Cameras; Central Africa; co-occurrence; daily activity patterns; duikers; Ecology, environment; Environmental Sciences; Environmental sciences & ecology; habitat preferences; Humanities and Social Sciences; Life Sciences; Methods and statistics; Mitochondrial DNA; overlap coefficient; Philantomba; Sciences and technics of agriculture; Sciences de l’environnement & écologie; Sciences du vivant; species diversity; Statistical analysis; surveys; Taxonomy; Central Africa; co-occurrence; overlap coefficient; Central Africa; duikers; daily activity patterns; camera traps; comportement animal; Overlap coefficient; animal sauvage; piège photographique; mesure (activité); instrument de mesure; Co-occurrence; Afrique centrale; organisme indigène; Camera-traps; forêt tropicale humide; enquête; Cephalophus; Daily activity patterns; Duikers; méthode statistique
• ISSN: 2076-2615; 2076-2615
• DOI: 10.3390/ani10122200

The duiker community in Central African rainforests includes a diversity of species that can coexist in the same area. The study of their activity patterns is needed to better understand habitat use or association between the species. Using camera traps, we studied the temporal activity patterns, and quantified for the first time the temporal overlap and spatial co-occurrence between species. Our results show that: (i) Two species are strongly diurnal: Cephalophus leucogaster, and Philantomba congica, (ii) two species are mostly diurnal: C.callipygus and C. nigrifrons, (iii) one species is strongly nocturnal: C.castaneus, (iv) and one species is mostly nocturnal: C.silvicultor. Analyses of temporal activities (for five species) identified four species pairs that highly overlapped (Δ^≥ 0.80), and six pairs that weakly overlapped (Δ^ between 0.06 and 0.35). Finally, co-occurrence tests reveal a truly random co-occurrence (plt > 0.05 and pgt > 0.05) for six species pairs, and a positive co-occurrence (pgt < 0.05) for four pairs. Positive co-occurrences are particularly noted for pairs formed by C.callipygus with the other species (except C. nigrifrons). These results are essential for a better understanding of the coexistence of duikers and the ecology of poorly known species (C. leucogaster and C. nigrifrons), and provide clarification on the activity patterns of C. silvicultor which was subject to controversy. Camera traps proved then to be a powerful tool for studying the activity patterns of free-ranging duiker populations.