High-throughput sequencing reveals dietary segregation in Malaysian babblers

Abstract

The coexistence of numerous species within a community results from how those species use available resources. Babblers are one of the major groups of Malaysian insectivorous birds, which frequently forage in dense vegetation cover and have a high level of sympatry. Therefore, examining the diet, prey selection and niche segregation of babblers can be challenging. In this study, we used high-throughput sequencing to investigate potential dietary overlap or segregation among 10 babbler species of the four genera of the family Pellorneidae and Timaliidae: Pellorneum, Malacopteron, Stachyris and Cyanoderma in central peninsular Malaysia. We tested the hypothesis that trophically similar species may differ in resource use to avoid competitive exclusion. We identified 81 distinct arthropod taxa from fecal samples, belonging to 71 families representing 13 orders, which were predominantly from 16 dipteran, 13 lepidopteran and 10 coleopteran families. Of all the prey taxa consumed, 45% were found to be distinct across the 10 babbler species, and less than 35% were shared simultaneously by three or more babbler species, indicating minimal dietary overlap. The black-throated babbler Stachyris nigricollis and moustached babbler Malacopteron magnirostre had the most generalist tendencies because they consumed a greater variety of prey taxa. Small dietary overlap values (Ojk) and a relatively wide range of food resources suggest that dietary segregation occurred among the studied babblers. The great diversity of prey consumed revealed the presence of dietary flexibility among the sympatric insectivorous birds, thus reducing any active dietary competition and facilitating the coexistence through niche partitioning.

Foraging strata and dietary preferences of fifteen species of babblers in Sarawak, Malaysia

“…Both protein and lipids (e.g., fats) are crucial for bird growth (Klasing 2000). Diet overlaps among babblers in this study were relatively low, consistent with reports from central Peninsular Malaysia (Mansor et al 2018(Mansor et al , 2021. The differences noted in foraging tactics might be one of the factors influencing the diet of the babbler species and vice versa.…”

“…Being terrestrial, foliage and/or bark gleaning insectivores, the major prey groups of the babblers comprises of relatively more terrestrial (i.e., Coleoptera, Hymenopter,a and Araneae of understory level, similar to Mansor et al (2018), except Blattodea) rather than aerial arthropods (but see Mansor et al 2021). The abundance of Hymenoptera such as ants and Araneae (spiders) on the forest floor (Griffiths et al 2018;Hartshorn et al 2021) as well as those in the aerial leaf litter (Mansor et al 2019) might be a reason that they formed a major portion of the babblers' diet.…”

Prey size is more representative than prey taxa when measuring dietary overlap in sympatric forest bats

“…Taking a high‐resolution approach, and in agreement with previous studies, we found high dietary overlap between predator species; however, M. sodalis generally preyed upon a greater richness of prey taxa, while M. septentrionalis preyed upon a greater range of sizes. In Malaysian babblers, dietary flexibility facilitates niche segregation and coexistence with low dietary overlap (Mansor et al, 2021). In this study, high dietary overlap was apparent at the OTU level and even moreso at the prey‐size type level (Table 2), suggesting little niche segregation.…”

Using Next-Generation Sequencing to Disentangle the Diet and Incidence of Intestinal Parasites of Falkland Flightless Steamer Duck Tachyeres brachypterus and Patagonian Crested Duck Lophonetta specularioides Sharing a South Atlantic Island

“…As complete competitors cannot coexist [ 1 , 2 ], the niche theory predicts that animals will segregate in the n-dimensional niche hyper-volume to avoid both inter- and intra-specific competition (e.g., [ 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 ]). Segregation can be achieved through differences in foraging behavior [ 7 ], habitat use, morphological adaptation or dietary specialization [ 8 , 9 ].…”