Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat diet
Widespread declines of terrestrial insects are reported across habitats and are associated with drivers at the landscape scale. Current monitoring schemes survey insect communities mostly at local scales, while assessments of insect trends at the landscape scale are scarce. Insectivorous bats provid...
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| Language: | English |
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Elsevier
2025-03-01
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| Series: | Basic and Applied Ecology |
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| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S143917912500012X |
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| author | Cynthia Tobisch Svenja Dege Bernd Panassiti Julian Treffler Christoph Moning |
| author_facet | Cynthia Tobisch Svenja Dege Bernd Panassiti Julian Treffler Christoph Moning |
| author_sort | Cynthia Tobisch |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Widespread declines of terrestrial insects are reported across habitats and are associated with drivers at the landscape scale. Current monitoring schemes survey insect communities mostly at local scales, while assessments of insect trends at the landscape scale are scarce. Insectivorous bats provide a feasible means to tackle this challenge, as they feed opportunistically on a wide variety of insects and other arthropods, while foraging in various habitats and thereby covering large distances between their roosts and hunting places. In this study, we analyzed the diet of a common European bat species (Pipistrellus pipistrellus) to investigate patterns in insect richness and composition at the landscape scale. We collected 24 fecal samples from 12 roosting places in Southern Germany and assessed insect richness and composition using DNA metabarcoding. We explored spatial and temporal variation in the diet of P. pipistrellus and quantified effects of landscape composition and configuration on insect species richness and composition using generalized linear models and non-metric multidimensional scaling. A total of 405 different insect and other arthropod species were identified in the fecal samples, with high proportions of Diptera (45 %), Lepidoptera (18 %), Coleoptera (13 %) and Hymenoptera (11 %), but also many other taxonomic groups. Species composition in the diet showed high variation in space and time, but was also associated with edge density and the proportion of grassland within 2 km radius of the roosts. Moreover, forest and grassland percentages within 2-km buffers around the roosts significantly increased species richness within the diet. Our study shows that genetic analysis of bat feces provides an efficient and promising approach to assess insect diversity patterns at the landscape level, and highlights the potential of widespread bat species for the monitoring of terrestrial insects at large scales. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-72d5090b0fe1456eb999c53adbd89fa8 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1439-1791 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-03-01 |
| publisher | Elsevier |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Basic and Applied Ecology |
| spelling | doaj-art-72d5090b0fe1456eb999c53adbd89fa82025-02-12T05:30:45ZengElsevierBasic and Applied Ecology1439-17912025-03-0183128135Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat dietCynthia Tobisch0Svenja Dege1Bernd Panassiti2Julian Treffler3Christoph Moning4Corresponding author at: Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences, Am Hofgarten 4, 85354 Freising, Germany.; Institute of Ecology and Landscape, Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences, Freising, GermanyInstitute of Ecology and Landscape, Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences, Freising, GermanyInstitute of Ecology and Landscape, Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences, Freising, GermanyInstitute of Ecology and Landscape, Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences, Freising, GermanyInstitute of Ecology and Landscape, Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences, Freising, GermanyWidespread declines of terrestrial insects are reported across habitats and are associated with drivers at the landscape scale. Current monitoring schemes survey insect communities mostly at local scales, while assessments of insect trends at the landscape scale are scarce. Insectivorous bats provide a feasible means to tackle this challenge, as they feed opportunistically on a wide variety of insects and other arthropods, while foraging in various habitats and thereby covering large distances between their roosts and hunting places. In this study, we analyzed the diet of a common European bat species (Pipistrellus pipistrellus) to investigate patterns in insect richness and composition at the landscape scale. We collected 24 fecal samples from 12 roosting places in Southern Germany and assessed insect richness and composition using DNA metabarcoding. We explored spatial and temporal variation in the diet of P. pipistrellus and quantified effects of landscape composition and configuration on insect species richness and composition using generalized linear models and non-metric multidimensional scaling. A total of 405 different insect and other arthropod species were identified in the fecal samples, with high proportions of Diptera (45 %), Lepidoptera (18 %), Coleoptera (13 %) and Hymenoptera (11 %), but also many other taxonomic groups. Species composition in the diet showed high variation in space and time, but was also associated with edge density and the proportion of grassland within 2 km radius of the roosts. Moreover, forest and grassland percentages within 2-km buffers around the roosts significantly increased species richness within the diet. Our study shows that genetic analysis of bat feces provides an efficient and promising approach to assess insect diversity patterns at the landscape level, and highlights the potential of widespread bat species for the monitoring of terrestrial insects at large scales.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S143917912500012XArthropod diversityBat guanoChiropteraDietary analysisDNA metabarcodingInsect monitoring |
| spellingShingle | Cynthia Tobisch Svenja Dege Bernd Panassiti Julian Treffler Christoph Moning Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat diet Basic and Applied Ecology Arthropod diversity Bat guano Chiroptera Dietary analysis DNA metabarcoding Insect monitoring |
| title | Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat diet |
| title_full | Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat diet |
| title_fullStr | Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat diet |
| title_full_unstemmed | Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat diet |
| title_short | Metabarcoding the night sky: Monitoring landscape-scale insect diversity through bat diet |
| title_sort | metabarcoding the night sky monitoring landscape scale insect diversity through bat diet |
| topic | Arthropod diversity Bat guano Chiroptera Dietary analysis DNA metabarcoding Insect monitoring |
| url | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S143917912500012X |
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