Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 7-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Fruit preferences by fishes in a Neotropical floodplain

Fruit preferences by fishes in a Neotropical floodplain The diets of frugivorous animals result from the interaction between feeding preference and ecological factors such as availability of alternative resources and interactions with other frugivores. A better understanding of frugivore diets will enable predictions about the vulnerability of plant populations to anthropogenic or natural environmental changes. In addition, frugivores with greater variation in diet (generalists) are potentially more resilient to habitat changes than specialists. Here, we combined data on diets of frugivorous fishes with visual censuses on fruit availability to evaluate if fishes are selective or opportunistic in their use of fruits in floodplain habitats. We found a high diversity of fruit species (74 species) frequently consumed by four common species of frugivorous fishes during the flooding season. The identity of preferred fruits, rather than their availability, had a stronger effect on the patterns of fruit consumed by fishes in this system. Fruit preferences by fish may influence the long‐term persistence and the maintenance of plant diversity in floodplain habitats. Possible disturbances of fish populations with selective consumption and the plant populations on which they depend could increase the vulnerability of both populations involved. Thus, selectivity may affect ecological and evolutionary processes associated with frugivory by fish. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Biotropica Wiley

Fruit preferences by fishes in a Neotropical floodplain

Download PDF
11 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/wiley/fruit-preferences-by-fishes-in-a-neotropical-floodplain-KEJRhDx9Hm

References (95)

Publisher
Wiley
Copyright
© 2020 The Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation
ISSN
0006-3606
eISSN
1744-7429
DOI
10.1111/btp.12790
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

The diets of frugivorous animals result from the interaction between feeding preference and ecological factors such as availability of alternative resources and interactions with other frugivores. A better understanding of frugivore diets will enable predictions about the vulnerability of plant populations to anthropogenic or natural environmental changes. In addition, frugivores with greater variation in diet (generalists) are potentially more resilient to habitat changes than specialists. Here, we combined data on diets of frugivorous fishes with visual censuses on fruit availability to evaluate if fishes are selective or opportunistic in their use of fruits in floodplain habitats. We found a high diversity of fruit species (74 species) frequently consumed by four common species of frugivorous fishes during the flooding season. The identity of preferred fruits, rather than their availability, had a stronger effect on the patterns of fruit consumed by fishes in this system. Fruit preferences by fish may influence the long‐term persistence and the maintenance of plant diversity in floodplain habitats. Possible disturbances of fish populations with selective consumption and the plant populations on which they depend could increase the vulnerability of both populations involved. Thus, selectivity may affect ecological and evolutionary processes associated with frugivory by fish.

Journal

Biotropica – Wiley

Published: Nov 1, 2020

Keywords: ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;

There are no references for this article.