Abstract
The flood pulse is the main factor structuring and differentiating the ecological communities of Amazonian unflooded (terra firme) and seasonally-flooded (várzea) forests as they require unique adaptations to survive the prolonged annual floods. Therefore, várzea and terra firme forests hammer out a spatio-temporal mosaic of resource availability, which may result in landscape scale seasonal movements of terrestrial vertebrates between adjacent forest types. Yet the lateral movements of terrestrial vertebrates between hydrologically distinct neighbouring forest types exhibiting staggered resource availability remains poorly understood, despite the important implications of this spatial dynamic for the ecology and conservation of forest wildlife. We examined the hypothesis of terrestrial fauna seasonal movements between two adjacent forest types at two contiguous sustainable-use forest reserves in Western Brazilian Amazonia. We used camera trapping data on the overall species richness, composition, and abundance of nine major vertebrate trophic guilds to infer on terrestrial vertebrate movements as a function of seasonal changes in floodplain water level. Species richness differed in neighboring terra firme forests between the high-and low-water phases of the flood pulse and terra firme forests were more species rich than várzea forests. There were clear differences in species composition between both forest types and seasons. Generalized Linear Models showed that water level was the main factor explaining aggregate abundance of all species and three trophic guilds. Our results indicate that the persistence of viable populations of large terrestrial vertebrates adjacent to major Amazonian rivers requires large, well-connected forest landscapes encompassing different forest types to ensure large-scale lateral movements by forest wildlife.
Highlights
Wetland habitats are both challenging to conserve and globally important for biodiversity conservation and human wellbeing (Keddy et al, 2009)
We provide crucial empirical evidence supporting the notion that Amazonian terra firme and várzea forests should be juxtaposed within fully functional floodplain protected areas, thereby enhancing both the spatial configuration of reserve design and landscape management of highly heterogeneous forest macromosaics in Amazonia for both biodiversity persistence and the subsistence of local extractive communities
During the low-water season, brocket deer, black agoutis, pacas, pale-winged trumpeter, razor-billed curassows and collared peccaries were more abundant in terra firme than in adjacent várzea forests, while tapirs, ocelots (L. pardalis), pumas (Puma concolor) and small tinamous (Crypturellus spp) presented higher detection rates in várzea (Fig. 3B)
Summary
Wetland habitats are both challenging to conserve and globally important for biodiversity conservation and human wellbeing (Keddy et al, 2009). Seasonal and perennial wetlands are exceptionally productive habitats that support both high densities and a high diversity of wild species (Halls, 1997; Junk et al, 2006). Amazonian floodplains comprise a variety of habitats including swamp forests, hydromorphic savannas, coastal wetlands, tidal forests, and seasonally-flooded forests. These Amazonian wetlands are classified according to their climatic, edaphic and floristic characteristics (Junk & Piedade, 2010; Junk et al, 2011). Two large groups of wetlands have been broadly distinguished: those with either (i) relatively stable or (ii) oscillating water levels (Junk et al, 2011)
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