0000000001327668
AUTHOR
Danilo Russo
First record of brown long-eared bat Plecotus auritus (Chiroptera: Vespertilionidae) for Sicily island (Italy)
The knowledge of the bat fauna of Sicily (Southern Italy) is scarce, fragmentary or sometimes even confusing. A recent review mentioned 20 species for the region, but it is likely that the checklist of bats of Sicily is still far from being exhaustive. To help fill this gap, in the past few years specific studies were carried out on the distribution of bat species in Sicily, especially in the woodlands of the Nebrodi Mountains. In the municipality of Caronia (Messina province) has captured a young female brown long-eared bat Plecotus auritus (Linneaus, 1758). The capture of P. auritus in Sicily represents the first record of brown long-eared bat Plecotus auritus for Sicily island, an intere…
Habitat preferences of bats in a rural area of Sicily determined by acoustic surveys
<strong>Abstract</strong> The bat fauna of a 60 km<sup>2</sup> wide area representing the typical rural landscape of inland Sicily and including the small &ldquo;Rocche di Entella&rdquo; karstic plateau (Natural Reserve and SAC) was surveyed between May 2006 and September 2007. Sampling was carried out at 95 sites, distributed proportionally in six main habitats. Bat calls were time-expanded with a D980 bat detector and then identified to species level by a Discriminant Function Analysis. We recorded 305 bat passes and identified 96.4% of recorded calls. Moon phase, cloud cover and their interaction did not affect total bat activity, nor did the sampling peri…
Hydrogen isotopes reveal evidence of migration of Miniopterus schreibersii in Europe
Abstract Background The Schreiber’s bat, Miniopterus schreibersii, is adapted to long-distance flight, yet long distance movements have only been recorded sporadically using capture-mark-recapture. In this study, we used the hydrogen isotopic composition of 208 wing and 335 fur specimens from across the species' European range to test the hypothesis that the species migrates over long distances. Results After obtaining the hydrogen isotopic composition (δ2H) of each sample, we performed geographic assignment tests by comparing the δ2H of samples with the δ2H of sampling sites. We found that 95 bats out of 325 showed evidence of long-distance movement, based on the analysis of either fur or …
Additional file 1 of Hydrogen isotopes reveal evidence of migration of Miniopterus schreibersii in Europe
Additional file 1. Summary of sampling sites and result outputs.
Overall (first) results of the ‘100 questions for biodiversity conservation in Mediterranean-type regions of the world’ initiative
Mediterranean-type ecosystems (MTEs), with their characteristic climate, occur in just five regions of the world: the Mediterranean Basin, the Cape Region of South Africa, Southwestern and South Australia, California, and central Chile. In spite of their small geographic area, they harbour a significant and exclusive proportion of the planet’s biodiversity. Biodiversity values in MTE are threatened by a range of factor including land use changes, overexploitation of natural resources, global climate changes, among others. Researchers have a key role in providing solutions for conserving biodiversity in face of these multiple stressors and socio-economic challenges. Under the scope of the So…
Priority questions for biodiversity conservation in the Mediterranean Basin
The Mediterranean Basin is considered one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots, harbouring particularly high species richness and endemicity of taxonomic groups such as plants. This hotspot is unique at the global scale, because it has a history of intense anthropogenic influences that dates back to thousands of years, and where the current high-levels of biodiversity have thus been able to coexist with humans for millennia. Despite this long history of coexistence, biodiversity in the Mediterranean Basin is at risk due to a number of old and new anthropogenic stressors, including fast land use changes, overexploitation of natural resources, and global climate change. To tackle these proble…