A Fruitful Endeavor: Scent Cues and Echolocation Behavior Used by Carollia castanea to Find Fruit.

ABSTRACT: Frugivores have evolved sensory and behavioral adaptations that allow them to find ripe fruit effectively, but the relative importance of different senses in varying foraging scenarios is still poorly understood. Within Neotropical ecosystems, short-tailed fruit bats (Carollia: Phyllostomidae) are abundant nocturnal frugivores that rely primarily on Piper fruits as a food resource. Previous research has demonstrated that Carollia employs olfaction and echolocation to locate Piper fruit, but it is unknown how their sensory use and foraging decisions are influenced by the complex diversity of chemical cues that fruiting plants produce. Using free-ranging C. castanea and their preferred food, Piper sancti-felicis, we conducted behavioral experiments t

SUBMITTER: Leiser-Miller LB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7671165 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature