Research Group 1: Evolutionary Ecology

CHRONOECOLOGY

Klaus M. Scheibe

Projects

1. Investigations on the impact of hunting and tourism on wildlife 

Protection and rest areas for wildlife can be found wordwide but their functions differ, they have been implemented with different intentions and they are subject to different conditions. We study the behavioural reactions of wildlife in respect to these different protection concepts in intention to contribute to their optimization. An important factor at this is the analysis of activity rhythms.

           - Wildlife rest areas in Brandenburg
           - Behaviour of roe deer in habitats nearby cities

Cooperation:
           - Diseases and causes of death in large birds
           - Cheetah project

Positioning of an animal over 24h via radio bearing

Video telemetry of rest areas from the mobile field station

2. The role of large herbivores in the European ecosystem

We analyse the differentiated impact of different herbivore species on their ecosystem. Furthermore we tackle open questions of protection area management and wildlife conservation. Here we specifically investigate on seasonal adaptations and interspecific interactions.

          - Heck cattle in the nature-sanctuary Falkenthaler Rieselfelder (in cooperation with the Naturschutzstation Malchow)

          - Large-area opening of postglacial landscape in the Lieberoser Heide through adapted ungulate populations
(in cooperation with the Brandenburg University Cottbus and Friends of the National Park Lieberoser Heide e.V)

          - Investigations on behaviour of Przewalski horses, mufflon sheep and fallow deer in the semireserve Schorfheide-Liebenthal

          - Bialowieza

Investigations on interactions between herbivores and vegetation, interspecific relations, time budgets and spaciotemporal niche selection are increasingly important in projects that aim on the conservation of the typical landscape as in the Lieberoser Heide.

3. Climate adaptations of ungulates

Year-round outdoor animal husbandry and climate changes require adaptations from animals that are analysed on the basis of behavioural and acitivity patterns.

          - Climate adaptations of horses (in cooperation with the Freie University Berlin, Dr. Struwe)

          - Reactions of African ungulates to climate factors (in cooperation with the University Johannishurg, Prof. Owen-Smith)

          - Climate reactions of cattle (ZALF Müncheberg)

Adaptations and reactions on climate factors are followed on the basis of activity patterns

4. Activity patterns of BSE and scrapie infected animals (in cooperation with the FU Berlin, Prof. Fries, BFA Riems)

Our project investigates on the question to what extent the infection course and the traceable changes in the CNS correlate with behavioural effects (behaviour budget and activity patterns).

Tracing changes of time budgets and behavioural patterns
in a scrapie infected herd.
 

5. Improvement and development of methods to provide a basis for new research areas:

Long-time data collection from free-ranging animals and selected outdoor locations respectively require the use and development of modern technique. For the on-going development and testing of new data collection systems we cooperate with Greenway-Systeme Frankfurt /Oder and  with the network "Telemetry, Telematics, Monitoring".

Telemetry: ETHOSYS, ETHOLOC, WAS,
field camera, trapping methods

project key literature: