Long-term Site Fidelity and Individual Home Range Shifts in Lophocebus albigena

We investigated long-term site fidelity of gray-cheeked mangabey (Lophocebus albigena) groups in Kibale National Park, Uganda. Concurrently, we monitored shifts in home range by individual females and subadult and adult males. We documented home range stability by calculating the area of overlap in successive years, and by recording the drift of each group’s monthly centroid from its initial location. Home ranges remained stable for 3 of our 4 groups (overlap over 10 yr >60%). Core areas were more labile, but group centroids drifted an average of only 530 m over the entire decade. Deviations from site fidelity were associated with dispersal or group fission. During natal dispersal, subadult males expanded their home ranges over many months, settling ≤4 home ranges away. Adult males, in contrast, typically dispersed within a few days to an adjacent group in an area of home range overlap. Adult males made solitary forays, but nearly always into areas used by their current group or by a group to which they had previously belonged. After secondary dispersal, they expanded their ranging in the company of their new group, apparently without prior solitary exploration of the new area. Some females also participated in home range shifts. Females shifted home ranges only within social groups, in association with temporary or permanent group splits. Our observations raise the possibility that male mangabeys use a finder-joiner mechanism when moving into new home ranges during secondary dispersal. Similarly, females might learn new resource locations from male immigrants before or during group fission

Mother-male bond, but not paternity, influences male-infant affiliation in wild crested macaques

In promiscuous primates, interactions between adult males and infants have rarely been investigated. However, recent evidence suggests that male affiliation towards infants has an influence on several aspects of the infants’ life. Furthermore, affiliations may be associated with male reproductive strategy. In this study, we examined which social factors influenced male-infant affiliation initiated by either male or infant, in wild crested macaques (Macaca nigra). We combined behavioral data and genetic paternity analysis from 30 infants living in three wild groups in Tangkoko Reserve, Indonesia. Our results indicate that adult males and infants do not interact at random, but rather form preferential associations. The social factors with the highest influence on infant-initiated interactions were male rank and male association with the infant’s mother. While infants initiated affiliations with males more often in the absence of their mothers, adult males initiated more affiliations with infants when their mothers were present. Furthermore, males initiated affiliations more often when they were in the same group at the time the infant was conceived, when they held a high dominance rank or when they had a close relationship with the mother. Interestingly, paternity did not affect male-infant affiliation despite being highly skewed in this species. Overall, our results suggest that adult males potentially associate with an infant to secure future mating with the mother. Infants are more likely to associate with a male to receive better support, suggesting a strategy to increase the chance of infant survival in a primate society with high infant mortality

Primate responses to changing environments in the anthropocene

Most primates have slow life-histories and long generation times. Because environmental change is occurring at an unprecedented rate, gene-based adaptations are unlikely to evolve fast enough to offer successful responses to these changes. The paper reviews the most common types of habitat/landscape alterations, the extent of human-primate interactions, and the impact of climate change. It demonstrates how understanding behavioural flexibility as a response to environmental change will be crucial to optimize conservation efforts by constructing informed management plans. Comparisons across species, space, and time can be used to draw generalizations about primate responses to environmental change while considering their behavioural flexibility

Products and services provided by the ‘Space Weather Application Center – Ionosphere’ (SWACI)

The ‘Space Weather Application Center – Ionosphere’ (SWACI) is a joint project of the Institute of Communications and Navigation and the German Remote Data Center of the German Aerospace Center (DLR). The project is essentially supported by the German State Government of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern until the end of 2010. The project shall provide nowcasts, forecasts, and alerts on the ionospheric state as well as related space weather issues. Typical data products include European maps of the Total Electron Content (TEC) and corresponding derivatives such as latitudinal and longitudinal gradients and rate of change, updated every 5 minutes. These service products are derived from 1s sampled data obtained from the International GNSS Service (IGS) and national networks such as the German SAPOS or ascos networks in streaming mode. Space based data products include vertical electron density profiles retrieved from radio occultation measurements onboard CHAMP and GRACE satellites as well as 3D reconstructions of the topside ionosphere using GPS navigation data onboard CHAMP. In order to better understand vertical electron density profile changes during ionospheric storms, the equivalent slab thickness over the ionosonde station Juliusruh/Germany is offered as an operational product updated every 15 minutes. In addition to the processing of GNSS data, also beacon measurements from various satellites such as NIMS (former NNSS) satellites and COSMIC are provided. High rate GNSS measurements (20-50 Hz) performed along a North-South chain of ground stations provide actual information on scintillation activity over Europe. Although the SWACI service will be fully operational by the end of 2010, some SWACI products are already available for interested users at a service level reached so far. An outlook to new products planned to be released next time will be given. The Data Information and Management System (DIMS) used in SWACI enables also the access to historical data (http://swaciweb.dlr.de). SWACI is connected to SWENET as continuous data provider of TEC data products. The service will take benefit from more intensified and coordinated international cooperation