Mammal diversity among vertical strata and the evaluation of a survey technique in a central Amazonian forest

Abstract

Mammal groups have a vast variety of habitats, which include aquatic, aerial, arboreal, and terrestrial. For terrestrial habitats, camera traps are used as a common technique to record mammals and other vertebrates and have been recently utilized to observe arboreal animals as well. Here, we compare the difference in mammal diversity between floor and canopy strata and evaluate the use of camera trapping in a lowland forest in central Amazon. We installed nine paired camera traps, one in the canopy stratum and other in the floor stratum, in the Alto Cuieiras Biological Reserve (Brazilian Amazon). With a sampling effort of 720 camera-days, we recorded 30 mammal species: nine in canopy strata, 14 in floor strata, and seven in scansorial strata (sharing both strata). On the forest floor, the species with the greatest abundance was Myoprocta acouchy; in the canopy, Isothrix paguros had the greatest abundance; and among the scansorial species, Proechymis sp. was the most abundant. Our results show the differences in mammal diversity between floor and canopy strata; canopy strata contained more small and frugivorous mammals. Although we obtained a relatively low sampling effort with the camera-trap method compared with other studies utilizing different techniques, our results were especially similar to those of previous studies that worked with canopy and floor strata. Thus, camera trap can be very effective for recording short periods of time, and this method is less physically exhaustive and expensive for researchers to study vertical strata.