Ground‐based vegetation descriptions and remote sensing as complementary methods describing habitat requirements of a frugivorous primate in northern Madagascar: implications for forest restoration

Abstract

AbstractNon‐human primate species are threatened worldwide. Their population declines go along with the loss of ecological functions such as seed dispersal that plays a crucial role in plant regeneration. Restoring essential habitat structures could thus not only protect primates, but also facilitate forest regeneration. We used classical vegetation description on the ground and a remote sensing analysis to describe habitat use of crowned lemurs (Eulemur coronatus), a seed‐dispersing primate endemic to northern Madagascar. Our aim was to find vegetation characteristics important for lemurs that might be targeted in a restoration approach. For this, we applied both methods in differently degraded forest types. Both classical vegetation description and remote sensing analysis were able to distinguish these forest types. The habitat use of our two study groups was associated consistently with vegetation structures measured on a small scale such as tree height and density of thick trees. In contrast, vegetation productivity and water content derived from satellite imagery on a larger scale could not consistently explain habitat use of lemurs. Thus, measurements on the ground can identify suitable microhabitats that do not show on the satellite imagery scale. These microhabitats might be very important conservation elements to create buffer zones and corridors. Further, they might attract seed‐dispersing species into degraded areas targeted for forest restoration, acting as natural regeneration nuclei. The potential of these microhabitats for conservation would not be recognized when analyses were based solely on landscape analyses on large scales.