Spatial behavior of northern flying squirrels in the same social network

Abstract

North American flying squirrels (Glaucomys spp.) are social species that communally den and exhibit home range overlap. However, observations on home range overlap tend to come from live‐trapped individuals and it is unknown whether overlap occurs among individuals belonging to the same social network. Since flying squirrels communally den with familiar individuals, their use of artificial nest boxes allows for the radio‐collaring and tracking of squirrels within the same social network. We captured and radio‐collared northern flying squirrels (G. sabrinus Shaw) found communally denning in nest boxes in the Appalachian Mountains in the eastern United States. We tracked squirrels captured from the same nest box (i.e., nest box groups) to determine home range overlap and subsequent den sharing between familiar individuals within those nest box groups. We found that amount of home range overlap did not differ between male–male, male–female, and female–female dyads, indicating that non‐reproductive females and scrotal males are not territorial at the 95% or 50% home range level. Regardless of sex, all dyads had a significantly higher probability of home range overlap (PHR) at the 95% than the 50% home range level (i.e., overlap between squirrels decreases in core areas of their home range). We also found flying squirrels subsequently denned with familiar individuals during 20.9% of occasions post‐collaring. Our study provides important information for understanding space use within flying squirrel social networks. Further work should be conducted to determine space use between familiar individuals including seasonal shifts in space use, degree of individual relatedness, and potential territoriality in females denning with young up to and following juvenile dispersal.

Can camera traps be used to differentiate species of North American flying squirrels?

“…We then selected high quality photos (i.e., not blurry or overexposed, body of the flying squirrel was not partially out of frame, body of the squirrel not scrunched or positioned at odd angles) for species designation models. Flying squirrels are social, nonterritorial, and have overlapping home ranges (Holloway and Malcolm 2007, Smith et al 2011, Diggins and Ford 2021), so it was unlikely that sites with multiple detections only detected a single individual. We obtained multiple photos of all species in groups of 2 individuals at most sites, including multiple photos of SFS in groups of 3–5 individuals.…”

Anthropogenically-induced range expansion as an invasion front in native species: An example in North American flying squirrels

“…Both species are highly social, exhibiting overlapping home ranges with conspecifics (Bendel and Gates, 1987;Holloway and Malcolm, 2007;Jacques et al, 2017;Diggins and Ford, 2021), communal denning…”

“…10.3389/fevo.2023.1096244 Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution 03 frontiersin.org (Stihler et al, 1987;Layne and Raymond, 1994;Reynolds et al, 2009), and large vocal repertoires for intraspecific communication, including alarm and mating calls (Gilley et al, 2019;Diggins, 2021). Denning aggregations can occur year-round (Reynolds et al, 2009;Diggins and Ford, 2021;Doty et al, 2022), but aggregation size typically increases in winter to reduce thermoregulatory costs associated with colder months of the year (Muul, 1968;Stapp et al, 1991;Thorington et al, 2010). Denning aggregations can contain related and unrelated individuals (Thorington et al, 2010;Garroway et al, 2013), wherein related aggregations in spring and summer are typically natal aggregations (i.e., nursing mother and offspring; Doty et al, 2022).…”

“…Competition for cavities may also increase interspecific overlap use in nest sites or interspecific nest sharing, which could facilitate S. robustus transmission or hybridization. However, resource competition is difficult to determine in the field, since spatial networks of flying squirrels are most likely complex, flying squirrels use multiple den sites, and nest sharing can be difficult to ascertain unless a large number of individuals or squirrels from nesting aggregations are radio-collared or PIT-tagged (Carey et al, 1997;Garroway et al, 2013;Diggins and Ford, 2021).…”