Data from: Does sex matter? Gender-specific responses to forest fragmentation in Neotropical bats

Understanding the consequences of habitat modification on wildlife communities is central to the development of conservation strategies. However, albeit male and female individuals of numerous species are known to exhibit differences in habitat use, sex-specific responses to habitat modification remain little explored. Here, we used a landscape-scale fragmentation experiment to assess, separately for males and females, the effects of fragmentation on the abundance of Carollia perspicillata and Rhinophylla pumilio, two widespread Neotropical frugivorous bats. We predicted that sex-specific responses would arise from higher energetic requirements from pregnancy and lactation in females. Analyses were conducted independently for each season, and we further investigated the joint responses to local and landscape-scale metrics of habitat quality, composition, and configuration. Although males and females responded similarly to a fragmentation gradient composed by continuous forest, fragment interiors, edges, and matrix habitats, we found marked differences between sexes in habitat use for at least one of the seasons. Whereas the sex ratio varied little in continuous forest and fragment interiors, females were found to be more abundant than males in edge and matrix habitats. This difference was more prominent in the dry season, the reproductive season of both species. For both species, abundance responses to local- and landscape-scale predictors differed between sexes and again, differences were more pronounced in the dry season. The results suggest considerable sex-mediated responses to forest disruption and degradation in tropical bats and complement our understanding of the impacts of fragmentation on tropical forest vertebrate communities.明晰生境改变对野生动物群落的影响，是制定保护策略的核心环节。然而，尽管已知诸多物种的雌雄个体在生境利用上存在差异，但针对生境改变的性别特异性响应仍鲜有探究。本研究借助景观尺度的破碎化实验，分别针对雌雄个体，评估了破碎化对两种广布新热带食果蝙蝠——短尾矛吻蝠（Carollia perspicillata）与小尖鼻蝠（Rhinophylla pumilio）——种群数量的影响。我们预测，雌性个体因妊娠和哺乳产生的更高能量需求，会导致其出现性别特异性的响应。本研究针对每个季节独立开展分析，并进一步探究了蝙蝠对生境质量、组成及构型的局地和景观尺度指标的综合响应。尽管雌雄个体对由连续森林、斑块内部、边缘及基质生境构成的破碎化梯度的响应相似，但我们发现，至少在一个季节中，两性在生境利用上存在显著差异。在连续森林和斑块内部，性别比例波动极小；而在边缘生境与基质生境中，雌性个体的种群数量显著高于雄性。这种差异在旱季更为显著，而旱季正是两个物种的繁殖季。对于两个物种而言，其种群数量对局地和景观尺度预测因子的响应在两性间存在差异，且这种差异在旱季同样更为突出。本研究结果表明，热带蝙蝠对森林破坏与退化存在显著的性别介导响应，同时也补充并完善了我们对破碎化对热带森林脊椎动物群落影响的认知。