Anthropogenic light, noise, and vegetation cover differentially impact different foraging guilds of bat on an opencast mine in South Africa
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Date
2022
Authors
Cory-Toussaint, Dawn
Taylor, Peter J.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Frontiers
Abstract
Bats are known to be sensitive to changes in their environment. The impact of natural vegetation cover, artificial light intensity and noise (dBA) were investigated on the bat community on the opencast Venetia diamond mine using mixed-effects models. Clutter-feeding bats were virtually absent compared to surrounding natural habitats, suggesting the negative impact of vegetation removal and/or light and/or noise pollution. Mixed-effect models revealed that natural vegetation was the most important factor impacting species richness and overall bat activity. In general, bat activity of both open-air and clutter-edge foragers was negatively impacted over areas close to mining operations that were devoid of vegetation cover. Artificial light only significantly affected feeding activity with less feeding activity in the lit areas. Anthropogenic noise had no significant impact on bat activity and species richness. Our study highlights the
importance of vegetation cover and the complexity of the interaction between bats and the environment incorporating anthropogenic factors (artificial lighting, continuous noise, and habitat degradation) and natural factors such as minimum temperature, moon phase, and season that confound trends in bat species richness and responses in relation to opencast mining.
Description
Keywords
Chiroptera, Anthropogenic light, Noise, Bat behaviour, Opencast mining, Bat ecology
Citation
Cory-Toussaint, D., & Taylor, P.J. (2022). Anthropogenic light, noise, and vegetation cover differentially impact different foraging guilds of bat on an opencast mine in South Africa. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 10, 752665. https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2022.752665