Edge effects and vertical stratification of aerial insectivorous bats across the interface of primary-secondary Amazonian rainforest

Edge effects, abiotic and biotic changes associated with habitat boundaries, are key drivers of community change in fragmented landscapes. Their influence is heavily modulated by matrix composition. With over half of the world’s tropical forests predicted to become forest edge by the end of the century, it is paramount that conservationists gain a better understanding of how tropical biota is impacted by edge gradients. Bats comprise a large fraction of tropical mammalian fauna and are demonstrably sensitive to habitat modification. Yet, knowledge about how bat assemblages are affected by edge effects remains scarce. Capitalizing on a whole-ecosystem manipulation in the Central Amazon, the aims of this study were to i) assess the consequences of edge effects for twelve aerial insectivorous bat species across the interface of primary and secondary forests and ii) investigate if the activity levels of these species differed between the understory and canopy and if they were modulated by d..., Acoustic recordings were collected from the Central Brazilian Amazon, 80 km north of Manaus, at the Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragments Project (BDFFP; 2024’26’’S, 59043’40’’W). Two static detectors (SM2Bat+, Wildlife Acoustics) with omnidirectional microphones (SMX-US Ultrasonic Microphone) were placed in the understory and canopy of 164 sample points. These sample points were spaced 50 m apart along four 2 km transects. Transects were located across two spatially independent sites to reduce site bias. Each transect extended through 1 km of secondary forest and then continued 1 km into the neighbouring primary forest. Surveys were conducted in the dry season of 2013 and the wet season of 2014 to minimise seasonal bias, equating to eight transect visits in total. The understory was defined as extending from the ground to a height of approximately 10 m and the canopy was defined as approximately 30 m from ground level. To ensure the understory and canopy samples were independent, pla..., , # Edge effects and vertical stratification of aerial insectivorous bats across the interface of primary-secondary Amazonian rainforest

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.0vt4b8h2d](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.0vt4b8h2d)

### Column headings and details

* Season: Season when the data was collected

* Edge1 = dry season (July - October 2013)
* Edge2 = wet season (November and June 2014)
* Location: One of two sites across the Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragments Project, Cabo Frio or Dimona
* Transect: One of four transects. There are two transects per location
* Distance: Distance from the habitat edge (m)

* Minus values represent secondary forest
* Positive values represent primary forest
* 0 represents habitat boundary
* Habitat: Either understory (U) or canopy (C) where detectors were placed
* Species: Species/sonotype codes

* *Cormura brevirostris (CB)*
* *Centronycteris maximiliani/centralis (CM)*
* *Eptesicus brasilie...