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Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Organisms that are similar in size, morphological characteristics, and adaptations, including vertebrates, often coexist by partitioning the available resources (food, space, and time). So, studies of the dynamics of these cases of coexistence are scientifically interesting. Here, we...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Petrozzi, Fabio, Gonedele Bi, Sery, Segniagbeto, Gabriel Hoinsoudé, Pacini, Nic, Fa, Julia E., Luiselli, Luca
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10451615/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37626941
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/biology12081054
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author Petrozzi, Fabio
Gonedele Bi, Sery
Segniagbeto, Gabriel Hoinsoudé
Pacini, Nic
Fa, Julia E.
Luiselli, Luca
author_facet Petrozzi, Fabio
Gonedele Bi, Sery
Segniagbeto, Gabriel Hoinsoudé
Pacini, Nic
Fa, Julia E.
Luiselli, Luca
author_sort Petrozzi, Fabio
collection PubMed
description SIMPLE SUMMARY: Organisms that are similar in size, morphological characteristics, and adaptations, including vertebrates, often coexist by partitioning the available resources (food, space, and time). So, studies of the dynamics of these cases of coexistence are scientifically interesting. Here, we study a coexistence case between two species of freshwater turtles inhabiting the forest waterbodies of West Africa, focusing on the dietary habits of the two species. We found that both turtle species are omnivorous generalists, eating both vegetal and animal matter abundantly. However, there were clear interspecific differences, with the larger of the two species (P. cupulatta) eating more vertebrates (mainly fish but occasionally other vertebrates), whereas P. castaneus consumed more invertebrates. We also showed that interspecific competition for food does not occur between these two species; instead, previous studies demonstrated that a clear partitioning of the habitat niche occurs. ABSTRACT: Organisms that are similar in size, morphological characteristics, and adaptations, including vertebrates, often coexist by partitioning the available resources (food, space, and time). So, studies of the dynamics of these cases of coexistence are scientifically interesting. Here, we study a coexistence case of two species of freshwater turtles inhabiting the forest waterbodies of West Africa, focusing on the dietary habits of the two species. We found that both turtle species are omnivorous generalists, eating both vegetal and animal matter abundantly. However, there were clear interspecific differences, with the larger of the two species (P. cupulatta) eating more vertebrates (mainly fish but occasionally other vertebrates), whereas P. castaneus consumed more invertebrates. These patterns appeared consistently within the species and across sites, highlighting that the same patterns were likely in other conspecific populations from the Upper Guinean forest streams (Côte d’Ivoire and Liberia). Our study also showed that interspecific competition for food does not occur between these two species; instead, previous studies uncovered that a clear partitioning of the habitat niche occurs. We conclude that the food resource is likely unlimited in the study areas, as it is not the case in more arid environments (since food shortages may occur during the dry season). We anticipate that, within the Pelomedusidae communities throughout Africa, intense competition for food probably occurs in the Sahel and Sudanian vegetation zones, particularly during the dry months, but is unlikely within the Guinea and wet savannah region and even less likely in the Guineo-Congolian rainforest region.
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spelling pubmed-104516152023-08-26 Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies Petrozzi, Fabio Gonedele Bi, Sery Segniagbeto, Gabriel Hoinsoudé Pacini, Nic Fa, Julia E. Luiselli, Luca Biology (Basel) Article SIMPLE SUMMARY: Organisms that are similar in size, morphological characteristics, and adaptations, including vertebrates, often coexist by partitioning the available resources (food, space, and time). So, studies of the dynamics of these cases of coexistence are scientifically interesting. Here, we study a coexistence case between two species of freshwater turtles inhabiting the forest waterbodies of West Africa, focusing on the dietary habits of the two species. We found that both turtle species are omnivorous generalists, eating both vegetal and animal matter abundantly. However, there were clear interspecific differences, with the larger of the two species (P. cupulatta) eating more vertebrates (mainly fish but occasionally other vertebrates), whereas P. castaneus consumed more invertebrates. We also showed that interspecific competition for food does not occur between these two species; instead, previous studies demonstrated that a clear partitioning of the habitat niche occurs. ABSTRACT: Organisms that are similar in size, morphological characteristics, and adaptations, including vertebrates, often coexist by partitioning the available resources (food, space, and time). So, studies of the dynamics of these cases of coexistence are scientifically interesting. Here, we study a coexistence case of two species of freshwater turtles inhabiting the forest waterbodies of West Africa, focusing on the dietary habits of the two species. We found that both turtle species are omnivorous generalists, eating both vegetal and animal matter abundantly. However, there were clear interspecific differences, with the larger of the two species (P. cupulatta) eating more vertebrates (mainly fish but occasionally other vertebrates), whereas P. castaneus consumed more invertebrates. These patterns appeared consistently within the species and across sites, highlighting that the same patterns were likely in other conspecific populations from the Upper Guinean forest streams (Côte d’Ivoire and Liberia). Our study also showed that interspecific competition for food does not occur between these two species; instead, previous studies uncovered that a clear partitioning of the habitat niche occurs. We conclude that the food resource is likely unlimited in the study areas, as it is not the case in more arid environments (since food shortages may occur during the dry season). We anticipate that, within the Pelomedusidae communities throughout Africa, intense competition for food probably occurs in the Sahel and Sudanian vegetation zones, particularly during the dry months, but is unlikely within the Guinea and wet savannah region and even less likely in the Guineo-Congolian rainforest region. MDPI 2023-07-27 /pmc/articles/PMC10451615/ /pubmed/37626941 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/biology12081054 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Petrozzi, Fabio
Gonedele Bi, Sery
Segniagbeto, Gabriel Hoinsoudé
Pacini, Nic
Fa, Julia E.
Luiselli, Luca
Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies
title Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies
title_full Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies
title_fullStr Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies
title_full_unstemmed Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies
title_short Trophic Resource Use by Sympatric vs. Allopatric Pelomedusid Turtles in West African Forest Waterbodies
title_sort trophic resource use by sympatric vs. allopatric pelomedusid turtles in west african forest waterbodies
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10451615/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37626941
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/biology12081054
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