The role of complex vegetation structures in determining hawking bat activity in temperate forests ...

(Uploaded by Plazi for the Bat Literature Project) Forests constitute one of the most important feeding and foraging habitats for bats. Because bat populations are declining, most likely due to habitat loss or fragmentation, it is imperative to understand the issues concerned with timber exploitatio...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Langridge, Joseph, Pisanu, Benoît, Laguet, Sébastien, Archaux, Frédéric, Tillon, Laurent
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:unknown
Published: Zenodo 2019
Subjects:
bat
Online Access:https://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13451386
https://zenodo.org/doi/10.5281/zenodo.13451386
Description
Summary:(Uploaded by Plazi for the Bat Literature Project) Forests constitute one of the most important feeding and foraging habitats for bats. Because bat populations are declining, most likely due to habitat loss or fragmentation, it is imperative to understand the issues concerned with timber exploitation on bat conservation. We investigated the foraging activity of edge- and open-space foragers in relation to stand and vegetation structure, characteristics that are commonly affected by forestry. Acoustic surveys, culminating to 713 point count sites were undertaken covering 46 different forest massifs across mainland France over 6 years. We used generalized linear mixed models to analyse the activity of ten species: 6 edge-habitat and 4 open-habitat foragers. Pipistrellus pipistrellus was the most detected edge-habitat forager, while Nyctalus leisleri was the most recorded of the open-habitat foragers. Eptesicus serotinus and P. pipistrellus responded positively to heterogeneous vertical vegetation volume. In ...