Socio-ecological determinants of movement behaviour in red-tailed monkeys (Cercopithecus ascanius schmidti)

In group-living primates, costs and benefits of sociality are reflected in movement behaviour: where groups move in their environment, and how individuals maintain cohesive groups while moving. Establishing environmental and social determinants of movement behaviour reveals adaptive responses that characterise primate sociality. For primates in different habitats, intra-specific behavioural variation provides insight into ecological pressures that drive habitat-specific adaptive responses. I investigated how group ranging and two individual behaviours that mediate intra-group cohesion – spatial positioning and contact calling – relate to food availability, weather, and social contexts in red-tailed monkeys (Cercopithecus ascanius), a forest guenon that also lives in forest scarce savanna-woodland environments. I predicted food availability and weather would have stronger effects on ranging in more seasonal savanna mosaics than forests, and individuals would 1) adjust inter-individual distances in response to increased feeding competition, and 2) adjust contact call acoustic structure to maximise propagation when neighbours were further away. I collected behavioural and ecological data at Ngogo, Uganda, a predominantly forested habitat with small patches of secondary forest, and Issa, Tanzania, a woodland-dominated mosaic with thin strips of riparian forest. Larger home ranges sizes and longer travel distances at Issa reflected lower food availability and hotter temperatures than at Ngogo. Behavioural responses to thermal conditions in secondary forest and woodland suggested comparable environmental heterogeneity across sites at fine spatial scales. Ngogo monkeys increased inter-individual distances where food availability was low and when travelling slower. Individual cohesion indicates trade-offs between reducing feeding competition and social foraging. Ngogo monkeys also adjusted call structures to match expected propagation to conspecifics depending if neighbours produced preceding grunts (i.e. antiphony). Environmental and social drivers of intra-specific movement behaviour reveal adaptive behavioural responses through which primates maintain sociality. Habitat-specific behaviour in red-tailed monkeys also improves our understanding of adaptations in hominins distributed across similar vegetation gradients

Observation of an Encounter between African Wild Dogs (Lycaon pictus) and a Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) in the Issa Valley, Tanzania

There has been considerable discussion of chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) as predators, most commonly of red colobus monkeys (Procolobus spp.). Far more infrequent are published descriptions of chimpanzees as prey. The paucity of direct observations of chimpanzee-predator encounters is an obstacle in situating chimpanzees in both predator and prey roles. For the first time, we describe an observation of an encounter between African wild dogs (Lycaon pictus) and a chimpanzee in the Issa Valley, Tanzania, one of the driest and most open chimpanzee habitats. Whilst the initiation of the encounter was missed, here we nonetheless interpret the data that we did record. Our observations of behavior in both parties suggest the possibility of an investigatory rather than predatory encounter on the part of the wild dogs

Cercopithecine and Colobine Abundance Across Protected and Unprotected Land in the Greater Mahale Ecosystem, Western Tanzania

Most primates live in unprotected land where abundances and threats may differ from those in protected areas. We therefore need to establish population densities in both unprotected and protected areas to effectively inform conservation planning. The Greater Mahale Ecosystem in western Tanzania is a region of mixed protected status with seven cercopithecine and colobine species: blue (Cercopithecus mitis doggetti), red-tailed (C. ascanius schmidi), and vervet (Chlorocebus pygerythrus) monkeys; ashy red colobus (Piliocolobus tephrosceles); black-and-white colobus (Colobus angolensis); and olive (Papio anubis) and yellow (P. cynocephalus) baboons. These species may be threatened by increasing human activity; however, except for ashy red colobus, no data on local abundances are available. We walked over 350 km of line transects in legally protected (Village Forest Reserves) and unprotected general land between August 2011 and October 2012 to estimate densities of primates and human activity. Primate densities were consistently low across the Greater Mahale Ecosystem. Blue and red-tailed monkey and ashy red colobus densities were especially low compared to populations in predominantly forested landscapes. Primate and human activity densities did not differ significantly inside and outside of reserves. Low primate densities could be natural responses to the lower proportions and quality of riparian forest habitat in the region. High levels of human activity and the absence of significantly higher primate densities in reserves suggest unprotected land could provide important refuges for primates in the Greater Mahale Ecosystem. This result further reinforces a broad need to include unprotected areas in primate conservation strategies. © 2019, The Author(s)

Leopard (Panthera pardus) predation on a red-tailed monkey (Cercopithecus ascanius) in the Issa Valley, western Tanzania.

Predation is predicted to be an important selection pressure for primates. Evidence for this hypothesis is rare, however, due to the scarcity of direct observations of primate predation. We describe an observation of leopard (Panthera pardus) predation on a red-tailed monkey (Cercopithecus ascanius schmidti) at the Issa Valley, a savanna-woodland mosaic landscape in western Tanzania. We compare rates of evidence of leopard presence between Issa and other primate study sites in sub-Saharan Africa. An increase in direct observations of leopards at Issa in recent years suggests that leopards may be habituating to researcher presence

Savanna Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) Consume and Share Blue Duiker (Philantomba monticola) Meat in the Issa Valley, Ugalla, Western Tanzania

Meat eating is pervasive across chimpanzee populations in Africa, with red colobus monkey (Piliocolobus spp.) being the most common prey (Boesch & Boesch 1989; Stanford et al. 1994a; Watts et al. 2012, Hosaka 2015) if sympatric in the same habitat. Besides colobus monkeys, chimpanzees consume a variety of other primates, including olive and yellow baboons (Papio spp.) and bushbabies (Galago spp.). In the forest habitats of western Tanzania chimpanzees have been reported to consume numerous different mammalian species: 18 at Mahale Mountains National Park (Uehara 1997; Hosaka 2015) and eight at Gombe National Park, whilst in the miombo woodland dominated Ugalla Region no direct observations have been recorded to date (Table 1). In West Africa, chimpanzees from Taï Forest, Ivory Coast consume eight different mammal species, all primates (Boesch & Boesch 1989). Wherever chimpanzees consume meat, it is almost always via hunting, as they rarely scavenge (Watts 2008)

Dispelling the myths of online education: learning via the information superhighway

There continues to be a perception that online education is inferior to traditional education. In the U.S. online learning is more developed than in the U.K. This paper provides insights into a U.S. provision and takes a close look at what are perceived as weaknesses of on line learning and argues that these are not necessarily inherent weaknesses of this form of educational delivery. Then, results of two major studies, undertaken in the U.S. are provided comparing the effectiveness of online education to traditional education as perceived by current MBA students and past graduates. Results of these studies suggest that students of MBA modules and MBA graduates perceive the quality and effectiveness of online education to be similar to, if not higher than, the quality and effectiveness of traditional modules and programmes

Red-tailed monkeys (Cercopithecus ascanius) prey upon and mob birds in the Issa Valley, western Tanzania.

Interactions between monkeys and birds are rarely observed and, consequently, rarely described in the scientific literature. We recorded two encounters between birds (Prionops plumatus and Strix woodfordii) and red-tailed monkeys (Cercopithecus ascanius) in a woodland-mosaic habitat in western Tanzania. We observed a male red-tailed monkey consume a small bird in its entirety. Although only a few feathers remained, we provisionally identified the bird as a white-crested helmetshrike. We also observed a group of red-tailed monkeys mobbing, but not killing, an African wood owl on the forest floor. This is the first reported observation of this kind. These encounters suggest that guenons may generalize large-bodied avians as threats and small-bodied avians as potential prey. Hetero-specific encounters such as these provide insights into primate diet and anti-predatory behavior

Food abundance and weather influence habitat-specific ranging patterns in forest- and savanna mosaic-dwelling red-tailed monkeys (Cercopithecus ascanius)

Objectives: Primates that live in predominantly forested habitats and open, savanna mosaics should exhibit behavioral responses to differing food distributions and weather. We compared ecological constraints on red-tailed monkey ranging behavior in forest and savanna mosaic environments. Intra specific variation in adaptations to these conditions may reflect similar pressures faced by hominins during the Plio-Pleistocene. Methods: We followed six groups in moist evergreen forest at Ngogo (Uganda), and one group in a savanna-woodland mosaic at the Issa Valley (Tanzania). We used spatial analyses to compare home range sizes and daily travel distances (DTD) between sites. We used measures of vegetation density and phenology to interpolate spatially explicit indices of food (fruit, flower, and leaves) abundance. We modeled DTD and range use against food abundance. We modeled DTD and at Issa hourly travel distances (HTD), against temperature and rainfall. Results: Compared to Issa, monkeys at Ngogo exhibited significantly smaller home ranges and less variation in DTD. DTD related negatively to fruit abundance, which had a stronger effect at Issa. DTD and HTD related negatively to temperature but not rainfall. This effect did not differ significantly between sites. Home range use did not relate to food abundance at either site. Conclusions: Our results indicate food availability and thermoregulatory constraints influence red-tailed monkey ranging patterns. Intra-specific variation in home range sizes and DTD likely reflects different food distributions in closed and open habitats. We compare our results with hypotheses of evolved hominin behavior associated with the Plio-Pleistocene shift from similar closed to open environments

Chimpanzees and their mammalian sympatriates in the Issa Valley, Tanzania

Chimpanzees have been studied for nearly 300 combined years across Africa, but aside from their roles as predators or prey, remarkably little is known about the diverse species with whom they share habitats. We calculated likely chimpanzee encounter rates with sympatric mammals in the Issa Valley, Tanzania, through modelling actual researcher encounter rates with all medium and large mammals. Compared to other long‐term chimpanzee study sites, Issa had a relatively high diversity in medium and large mammal species present, with 36 species documented. We encountered common duiker (Sylvicapra grimmia) most frequently, followed by yellow baboons (Papio cynocephalus) and bushbuck. Chimpanzees ranked fifth overall. Chimpanzees, on the other hand, were predicted to most frequently encounter bushbuck, klipspringer and hartebeest—all woodland species. We compare these results to published literature and contextualise them in light of reconstructing diverse mammalian communities in which hominins lived during the Plio‐Pleistocene and the use of chimpanzees as flagship species for conservation policy

Nutritional Systems Biology Modeling: From Molecular Mechanisms to Physiology

The use of computational modeling and simulation has increased in many biological fields, but despite their potential these techniques are only marginally applied in nutritional sciences. Nevertheless, recent applications of modeling have been instrumental in answering important nutritional questions from the cellular up to the physiological levels. Capturing the complexity of today's important nutritional research questions poses a challenge for modeling to become truly integrative in the consideration and interpretation of experimental data at widely differing scales of space and time. In this review, we discuss a selection of available modeling approaches and applications relevant for nutrition. We then put these models into perspective by categorizing them according to their space and time domain. Through this categorization process, we identified a dearth of models that consider processes occurring between the microscopic and macroscopic scale. We propose a “middle-out” strategy to develop the required full-scale, multilevel computational models. Exhaustive and accurate phenotyping, the use of the virtual patient concept, and the development of biomarkers from “-omics” signatures are identified as key elements of a successful systems biology modeling approach in nutrition research—one that integrates physiological mechanisms and data at multiple space and time scales