Different coexistence patterns between apex carnivores and mesocarnivores based on temporal, spatial, and dietary niche partitioning analysis in Qilian Mountain National Park, China
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Curated by eLife
eLife assessment
This paper provides an important assessment of competition dynamics allowing coexistence of the carnivore guild within a large national park. A solid dataset and multiple surveying techniques (camera traps and DNA metabarcoding) provide convincing evidence that spatial segregation represents the main strategy of coexistence, while species have a certain degree of temporal and dietary overlap. Altogether, the manuscript provides important information critical to the conservation and management agenda of the park.
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Abstract
Carnivores play key roles in maintaining ecosystem structure and function as well as ecological processes, understanding how sympatric species coexistence mechanism in natural ecosystems is a central research topic in community ecology and biodiversity conservation. In this study, we explored intra- and interspecific niche partitioning along spatial, temporal, and dietary niche partitioning between apex carnivores (wolf Canis lupus , snow leopard Panthera uncia , Eurasian lynx Lynx lynx ) and mesocarnivores (Pallas’s cat Otocolobus manul , red fox Vulpes vulpes , Tibetan fox Vulpes ferrilata ) in the Qilian Mountain national park of China using camera trapping data and DNA metabarcoding sequencing data. Our study showed that apex carnivore species had more overlap temporally (the value of time overlap from 0.661 to 0.900) or trophically (the value of diet overlap from 0.458 to 0.892), mesocarnivore species had high dietary overlap with each other (the value of diet overlap from 0.945 to 0.997), and apex carnivore and mesocarnivore species had high temporal overlap (the value of time overlap from 0.497 to 0.855). Large dietary overlap was observed between wolf and snow leopard (Pianka’s index=0.892) and Pallas’s cat and Tibetan fox (Pianka’s index=0.997) and suggesting increased resource competition for these pair species were existed. We conclude that spatial niche partitioning playing a key role in facilitating the coexistence of apex carnivore species, spatial and temporal niche partitioning facilitate the coexistence of mesocarnivore species, and spatial and dietary niche partitioning facilitate the coexistence between apex and mesocarnivore species. Our findings address, for the first time, niche partitioning was considered across temporal, spatial and dietary dimensions and diverse coexistence patterns of carnivore species were presented in the Qilian Mountain national park of China. These finding will contribute substantially to current understanding of carnivore guilds and effective conservation management in fragile alpine ecosystems.
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eLife assessment
This paper provides an important assessment of competition dynamics allowing coexistence of the carnivore guild within a large national park. A solid dataset and multiple surveying techniques (camera traps and DNA metabarcoding) provide convincing evidence that spatial segregation represents the main strategy of coexistence, while species have a certain degree of temporal and dietary overlap. Altogether, the manuscript provides important information critical to the conservation and management agenda of the park.
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Reviewer #1 (Public Review):
Summary:
This work explored intra and interspecific niche partitioning along spatial, temporal, and dietary niche partitioning between apex carnivores and mesocarnivores in the Qilian Mountain National Park of China, using camera trapping data and DNA metabarcoding sequencing data. They conclude that spatial niche partitioning plays a key role in facilitating the coexistence of apex carnivore species, spatial and temporal niche partitioning facilitate the coexistence of mesocarnivore species, and spatial and dietary niche partitioning facilitate the coexistence between apex and mesocarnivore species. The information presented in this study is important for wildlife conservation and will contribute substantially to the current understanding of carnivore guilds and effective conservation management in fragile …Reviewer #1 (Public Review):
Summary:
This work explored intra and interspecific niche partitioning along spatial, temporal, and dietary niche partitioning between apex carnivores and mesocarnivores in the Qilian Mountain National Park of China, using camera trapping data and DNA metabarcoding sequencing data. They conclude that spatial niche partitioning plays a key role in facilitating the coexistence of apex carnivore species, spatial and temporal niche partitioning facilitate the coexistence of mesocarnivore species, and spatial and dietary niche partitioning facilitate the coexistence between apex and mesocarnivore species. The information presented in this study is important for wildlife conservation and will contribute substantially to the current understanding of carnivore guilds and effective conservation management in fragile alpine ecosystems.Strengths:
Extensive fieldwork is evident in the study. Aiming to cover a large percentage of the Qilian Mountain National Park, the study area was subdivided into squares, as a geographical reference to distribute the sampling points where the camera traps were placed and the excreta samples were collected.They were able to obtain many records in their camera traps and collected many samples of excreta. This diversity of data allowed them to conduct robust analyses. The data analyses carried out were adequate to obtain clear and meaningful results that enabled them to answer the research questions posed. The conclusions of this paper are mostly well supported by data.
The study has demonstrated the coexistence of carnivore species in the landscapes of the Qilian Mountains National Park, complementing the findings of previous studies. The information presented in this study is important for wildlife conservation and will contribute substantially to the current understanding of carnivore guilds and effective conservation management in fragile alpine ecosystems.
Weaknesses:
It is necessary to better explain the methodology because it is not clear what is the total sampling effort. In methodology, they only claim to have used 280 camera traps, and in the results, they mention that there are 319 sampling sites. However, the total sampling effort (e.g. total time of active camera traps) carried out in the study and at each site is not specified. -
Reviewer #2 (Public Review):
Summary:
The study entitled "Different coexistence patterns between apex carnivores and mesocarnivores based on temporal, spatial, and dietary niche partitioning analysis in Qilian Mountain National Park, China" by Cong et al. addresses the compelling topic of carnivores' coexistence in a biodiversity hotspot in China. The study is interesting given it considers all three components affecting sympatric carnivores' distribution and co-occurrence, namely the temporal, the spatial, and the dietary partition within the carnivore guild. The authors have found that spatial co-occurrence is generally low, which represents the major strategy for coexistence, while there is temporal and dietary overlap. I also appreciated the huge sampling effort carried out for this study by the authors: they were able to deploy 280 …Reviewer #2 (Public Review):
Summary:
The study entitled "Different coexistence patterns between apex carnivores and mesocarnivores based on temporal, spatial, and dietary niche partitioning analysis in Qilian Mountain National Park, China" by Cong et al. addresses the compelling topic of carnivores' coexistence in a biodiversity hotspot in China. The study is interesting given it considers all three components affecting sympatric carnivores' distribution and co-occurrence, namely the temporal, the spatial, and the dietary partition within the carnivore guild. The authors have found that spatial co-occurrence is generally low, which represents the major strategy for coexistence, while there is temporal and dietary overlap. I also appreciated the huge sampling effort carried out for this study by the authors: they were able to deploy 280 camera trapping sites (which became 322 in the result section?) and collect a total of 480 scat samples. However, I have some concerns about the study on the non-consideration of the human dimension and potential anthropogenic disturbance that could affect the spatial and temporal distribution of carnivores, the choice of the statistical model to test co-occurrence, and the lack of clearly stated ecological hypotheses.Strengths:
The strengths of the study are the investigation of all three major strategies that can mitigate carnivores' coexistence, therefore, the use of multiple monitoring techniques (both camera trapping and DNA metabarcoding) and the big dataset produced that consists of a very large sampled area with a noteworthy number of camera tap stations and many scat samples for each species.Weaknesses:
I think that some parts of the manuscript should be written better and more clearly. A clear statement of the ecological hypotheses that could affect the partitioning among the carnivore guild is lacking. I think that the human component (thus anthropogenic disturbance) should have been considered more in the spatial analyses given it can influence the use of the environment by some carnivores. Additionally, a multi-species co-occurrence model would have been a more robust approach to test for spatial co-occurrence given it also considers imperfect detection.Temporal and dietary results are solid and this latter in particular highlights a big predation pressure on some prey species such as the pika. This implies important conservation and management implications for this species, and therefore for the trophic chain, given that i) the pika population should be conserved and ii) a potential poisoning campaign against small mammals could be incredibly dangerous also for mesocarnivores feeding on them due to secondary poisoning.
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