Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-lj6df Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T02:40:38.405Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Territoriality in females of the slender opossum (Marmosops paulensis) in the Atlantic forest of Brazil

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 October 2009

Natália Oliveira Leiner  and
Wesley Rodrigues Silva
Natália Oliveira Leiner*
Affiliation:
Graduate Program in Ecology, Instituto de Biologia, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, 13083–970, Campinas, SP, Brazil
Wesley Rodrigues Silva
Affiliation:
Laboratório de Interações Vertebrados-Plantas, Departamento de Zoologia, Instituto de Biologia, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, 13083–970 Campinas, SP, Brazil
*
1Corresponding author. Current address: Laboratório de Ecologia Comportamental e de Interações, Instituto de Biologia, Campus Umuarama, Caixa Postal 593, CEP 38400–902, Uberlândia, MG, Brazil. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Spatial organization within animal populations is often thought to reflect the outcome of strategies implemented by each individual to enhance its reproductive success and survival (Clutton-Brock 1989). Thus, while females usually focus on the acquisition of food and breeding sites, male dispersion is more often determined by the distribution and availability of females (Clutton-Brock 1989). Due to these factors, intraspecific competition for space could lead to the adoption of a territorial strategy, whenever the benefits of territorial defence are higher than the costs (Brown & Orians 1970). Among small mammals, two main hypotheses have been proposed to explain the occurrence of territoriality in females. Ostfeld (1990) proposed that females should defend food resources, so the distribution and availability of food items should determine the cost–benefit relationship of adopting a territorial strategy. However, Wolff (1993) developed a hypothesis, based on small rodents, that females should defend nest sites in order to avoid infanticide, the so-called pup-defence hypothesis.

Keywords

home rangemating systemsmarsupialsspatial patternsterritoriality
Type
Short Communication
Information
Journal of Tropical Ecology , Volume 25 , Issue 6 , November 2009 , pp. 671 - 675
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

LITERATURE CITED

BROWN, J. L. & ORIANS, G. H. 1970. Spacing patterns in mobile animals. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 1:239–262.Google Scholar
CÁCERES, N. & MONTEIRO-FILHO, E. L. A. 2001. Food habits, home range and activity of Didelphis aurita (Mammalia: Marsupialia) in a forest fragment of southern Brazil. Studies on Neotropical Fauna and Environment 36:85–92.Google Scholar
CLUTTON-BROCK, T. H. 1989. Mammalian mating systems. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B Biological Sciences 236:339–372.Google Scholar
CROFT, D. B. & EISENBERG, J. F. 2006. Behaviour. Pp. 229–298 in Armati, P., Dickman, C. & Hume, I. (eds). Marsupials. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
FREITAS, D. & FERNANDEZ, F. A. S. 1998. Efficiency of small mammal trapping in Atlantic Forest fragments: the effects of trap type and position. Vida Silvestre Neotropical (Costa Rica) 7:27–33.Google Scholar
HARDER, J. D., HSU, M. J. & GARTON, D. W. 1996. Metabolic rates and body temperature of the gray short-tailed opossum (Monodelphis domestica) during gestation and lactation. Physiological Zoology 69:317–339.Google Scholar
HARESTAD, A. S. & BUNNELL, F. L. 1979. Home range and body weight – a reevaluation. Ecology 60:389–402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
HOLLELEY, C. E., DICKMAN, C. R., CROWTHER, M. S. & OLDROYD, B. P. 2006. Size breeds success: multiple paternity, multivariate selection and male semelparity in a small marsupial, Antechinus stuartii. Molecular Ecology 15;3439–3448.Google Scholar
KIE, J. G, BALDWIN, J. A. & EVANS, C. J. 1996. CALHOME: a program for estimating animal home ranges. Wildlife Society Bulletin 24:342–344.Google Scholar
LEINER, N. O. & SILVA, W. R. 2007a. Effects of resource availability on the use of space by the mouse opossum Marmosops paulensis (Didelphidae) in a montane Atlantic forest area, southeastern Brazil. Acta Theriologica 52:197–204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LEINER, N. O. & SILVA, W. R. 2007b. Seasonal variation in the diet of the Brazilian slender opossum (Marmosops paulensis) in a Montane Atlantic Forest area, southeastern Brazil. Journal of Mammalogy 88:158–164.Google Scholar
LEINER, N. O., SETZ, E. Z. F. & SILVA, W. R. 2008. Semelparity and factors affecting reproductive activity of the Brazilian slender opossum (Marmosops paulensis) in southeastern Brazil. Journal of Mammalogy 89:153–158.Google Scholar
MUSTRANGI, M. & PATTON, J. L. 1997. Phylogeography and systematics of the slender mouse opossum, Marmosops (Marsupialia, Didelphidae). University of California Publications in Zoology 130:1–86.Google Scholar
OAKWOOD, M. 2002. Spatial and social organization of a carnivorous marsupial Dasyurus hallucatus (Marsupialia: Dasyuridae). Journal of Zoology 257:237–248.Google Scholar
OSTFELD, R. S. 1990. The ecology of territoriality in small mammals. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 5:411–415.Google Scholar
PIRES, A. S., FERNANDEZ, F. A. S. & FREITAS, D. 1999. Patterns of use of space by Micoureus demerarae (Marsupialia: Didelphidae) in a fragment of Atlantic forest in Brazil. Mastozoología Neotropical (Argentina) 6:5–12.Google Scholar
RYSER, J. 1992. The mating system and male mating success of the Virginia opossum (Didelphis virginiana) in Florida. Journal of Zoology, London 228:127–139.Google Scholar
SODERQUIST, T. R. 1995. Spatial organization of the arboreal carnivorous marsupial Phascogale tapoatafa. Journal of Zoology, London 237:385–398.Google Scholar
STOCKLEY, P., SEARLE, J. B., MACDONALD, D. W. & JONES, C. S. 1996. Correlates of reproductive success within alternative mating tactics of the common shrew. Behavioral Ecology 7:334–340.Google Scholar
WOLFF, J. O. 1993. Why are female small mammals territorial? Oikos 68:364–370.Google Scholar