Diet of adult and juvenile golden jackals (Canis aureus) during cubs` dependency stage

Abstract

Golden jackal populations in the Balkans are increasing and spreading its range. Nowadays vagrant specimens are reaching the northern parts of Europe. As one of the prerequisites for actual population increase is a solid food base, we examined the feeding habits of adult and juvenile jackals in Serbia in the period of cub dependency stage. Stomach content of 49 adults and 28 cubs from period July-October were analyzed. Juvenile jackals had less diverse diet than the adults, represented with eight food categories. During this part of the year, jackals of both age categories were mostly consuming small mammals. Moreover, they were the main prey category in the diet of juveniles (49.82 %B and 32.08 %O). No game species were recorded in the diet of juvenile jackals. During their first summer and autumn, jackal cubs already manifest the opportunistic feeding behavior. They take advantage of easily accessible food sources such as fruit and slaughter leftovers from domestic ungulates and poultry.