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The role of landscape context in shaping bat assemblages in African cacao plantations

Ferreira, Diogo F.; Jarrett, Crinan; Atagana, Patrick Jules; Welch, Andreanna J.; Powell, Luke L.; Rebelo, Hugo

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Authors

Diogo F. Ferreira

Crinan Jarrett

Patrick Jules Atagana

Luke L. Powell

Hugo Rebelo



Abstract

Cacao production is mostly concentrated in Africa, with this continent exporting an impressive 68.4 % of the world's cacao. The increasing demand for cacao from the Global North has already led to massive deforestation in Ghana and Ivory Coast and cacao-driven deforestation is likely to continue changing landscapes in Sub-Saharan Africa. Bats are affected by these landscape changes due to their dependence on multiple resources spread at a large spatial scale. Although bats can save cacao farmers millions of euros through pest suppression, no study has investigated how landscape context affects bat communities in African cacao plantations. Here for the first time, we studied how abundance and richness of insectivorous, frugivorous and nectarivorous bats within cacao landscapes could be affected by cover type and the distance between these habitats and each cacao plantation. We sampled bats using mist-nets in 38 cacao plantations spread throughout southern Cameroon from 2017 to 2020. We found that guilds responded differently to the distance and amount of cover of each of the land cover types, with the scale of response being habitat-dependent. Overall, insectivorous bats were associated positively with high cover of natural habitats (e.g., tree cover, rangeland, and flooded vegetation), and negatively with nearby anthropogenic disturbance (e.g., logging and intensive agriculture). Frugivorous and nectarivorous bats were associated to the presence of natural habitats with water and of nearby anthropogenic habitats (e.g., human settlements, community forests and unpaved roads), probably due to the presence of more fruiting and flowering trees. Considering the associations found between the landscape metrics and bats, we propose three different conceptual designs to manage cacao landscapes: one for insectivores, one for frugivores/nectarivores and a third design that maximises the trade-offs between these three guilds. By safeguarding the diversity of these three guilds farmers can maintain pest suppression services within their plantations and guarantee healthy and long-lasting sustainable cacao landscapes through bats' pollination and seed dispersal.

Citation

Ferreira, D. F., Jarrett, C., Atagana, P. J., Welch, A. J., Powell, L. L., & Rebelo, H. (2024). The role of landscape context in shaping bat assemblages in African cacao plantations. Science of the Total Environment, 954, Article 176393. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.176393

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Sep 17, 2024
Online Publication Date Sep 20, 2024
Publication Date Dec 1, 2024
Deposit Date Sep 24, 2024
Publicly Available Date Sep 26, 2024
Journal Science of the Total Environment
Print ISSN 0048-9697
Electronic ISSN 1879-1026
Publisher Elsevier
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 954
Article Number 176393
DOI https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.176393
Public URL https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/2875834

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