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Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal

Browsers represent a challenge for breeding facilities because of their sensitivity to nutritional management. Western Derby eland (Tautrotragus derbianus derbianus, WDE) is a large browsing antelope with a very diverse diet. Because of its critically endangered status, a small WDE population is kep...

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Autores principales: Hejcmanová, Pavla, Miřejovská, Magdalena, Homolka, Petr, Hejcman, Michal
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6582054/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31213612
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-45035-z
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author Hejcmanová, Pavla
Miřejovská, Magdalena
Homolka, Petr
Hejcman, Michal
author_facet Hejcmanová, Pavla
Miřejovská, Magdalena
Homolka, Petr
Hejcman, Michal
author_sort Hejcmanová, Pavla
collection PubMed
description Browsers represent a challenge for breeding facilities because of their sensitivity to nutritional management. Western Derby eland (Tautrotragus derbianus derbianus, WDE) is a large browsing antelope with a very diverse diet. Because of its critically endangered status, a small WDE population is kept for conservation purposes in the fenced Fathala reserve (Senegal) and during the critical, hot dry season, the animals are offered supplementary Acacia albida pods. We aimed to identify which woody plant species were preferentially selected/avoided by WDE during the period of food shortage, which plant nutritional properties were drivers of animals’ diet selection, and how this selectivity was affected by supplemental feed. The animals were selective for certain plant species, most for Piliostigma thonningi pods. Preferences decreased with a feed supplement, while avoidances remained intact. Diet selection was connected with chemical traits, mostly by negative correlations to N, Mg, Ca and hemicellulose, which disappeared or were weaker when supplemental feed was offered. Our findings indicate that large browsers during periods of food shortage must cope with inappropriate chemical composition in regard to nutrition and seek to alleviate them not only by diversification of plant species in the diet, but also by adjusting chemical diet quality as a whole.
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spelling pubmed-65820542019-06-26 Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal Hejcmanová, Pavla Miřejovská, Magdalena Homolka, Petr Hejcman, Michal Sci Rep Article Browsers represent a challenge for breeding facilities because of their sensitivity to nutritional management. Western Derby eland (Tautrotragus derbianus derbianus, WDE) is a large browsing antelope with a very diverse diet. Because of its critically endangered status, a small WDE population is kept for conservation purposes in the fenced Fathala reserve (Senegal) and during the critical, hot dry season, the animals are offered supplementary Acacia albida pods. We aimed to identify which woody plant species were preferentially selected/avoided by WDE during the period of food shortage, which plant nutritional properties were drivers of animals’ diet selection, and how this selectivity was affected by supplemental feed. The animals were selective for certain plant species, most for Piliostigma thonningi pods. Preferences decreased with a feed supplement, while avoidances remained intact. Diet selection was connected with chemical traits, mostly by negative correlations to N, Mg, Ca and hemicellulose, which disappeared or were weaker when supplemental feed was offered. Our findings indicate that large browsers during periods of food shortage must cope with inappropriate chemical composition in regard to nutrition and seek to alleviate them not only by diversification of plant species in the diet, but also by adjusting chemical diet quality as a whole. Nature Publishing Group UK 2019-06-18 /pmc/articles/PMC6582054/ /pubmed/31213612 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-45035-z Text en © The Author(s) 2019 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Hejcmanová, Pavla
Miřejovská, Magdalena
Homolka, Petr
Hejcman, Michal
Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal
title Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal
title_full Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal
title_fullStr Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal
title_full_unstemmed Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal
title_short Drivers of diet selection of critically endangered Western Derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in Senegal
title_sort drivers of diet selection of critically endangered western derby eland during the food shortage period within conservation breeding in senegal
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6582054/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31213612
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-45035-z
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