Burrow architecture,family composition and habitat characteristics of the largest social African mole-rat: the giant mole-rat constructs really giant burrow systems |
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Authors: | Radim Šumbera Vladimír Mazoch Hana Patzenhauerová Matěj Lövy Jan Šklíba Josef Bryja Hynek Burda |
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Institution: | 1.Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science,University of South Bohemia,?eské Budějovice,Czech Republic;2.Department of Population Biology, Institute of Vertebrate Biology,Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic,Brno,Czech Republic;3.Department of General Zoology, Faculty of Biology,University of Duisburg-Essen,Essen,Germany |
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Abstract: | Among African mole-rats, the giant mole-rat Fukomys mechowii is the largest social species. Despite several attempts to study a free-living population, information on its biology from
natural habitats is very scarce. We mapped two neighbouring burrow systems of the giant mole-rat in a miombo woodland in Zambia.
We provide information on the size and kin structure of the respective mole-rat families, architecture of their burrow systems,
and characteristics of the food supply and soil around the two mapped and additional ten burrow systems. Both uncovered burrow
systems were very large (total lengths, 2,245 and 743 m), making them the largest burrow systems ever mapped. Food resources
around the additional ten burrow systems had a clumped distribution (standardized Morisita index of dispersion = 0.526), but
a relatively high biomass (298 ± 455 g m−2). This, together with favourable soil conditions even in the advanced dry season (cone resistance, 328 ± 50 N m−2; soil density, 1.36 ± 0.06 g cm−3) indicates relatively hospitable ecological conditions. Both food supply and soil conditions were comparable with the conditions
found in a miombo habitat of the solitary silvery mole-rat in Malawi. This suggests that there are no ecological constraints
which would preclude the solitary life of a subterranean herbivore from the examined habitat. Microsatellite analysis supported
the assumption that giant mole-rats live in monogamous multigenerational families with only one breeding pair of non-related
animals and their offspring. The mean family size is consistent with previous findings on this species and comparable to that
found in other Fukomys species studied thus far. |
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