ABSTRACT

We studied time-of-day and seasonal variations in the foraging behavior of street cattle in Raipur city, India. We recorded the foraging behavior of street cattle at 48-time points each day for over three consecutive days at 10 different locations of Raipur city across three distinct seasons of the year. We log-transformed the time series data and employed Single Cosinor to compute the characteristics of time-of-day variation in foraging activity. We also determined the effects of the factors “time-of-day” and “season” on foraging behavior and the number of cattle. We found statistically significant time-of-day variation in foraging pattern with the peaks located mostly at midday hours, irrespective of seasons. The amplitude of foraging was the least in the summer as compared with the rainy and the winter seasons. The factors “time-of-day” and “season” modulated both foraging activity and frequency of cattle on the streets statistically significantly. The observed spatiotemporal patterns in the foraging behavior of cattle on the streets might provide useful information to the stakeholders engaged in mitigating the urban cattle menace in Raipur city and elsewhere in the world.

摘要

我们研究了印度赖布尔市街头牛觅食行为的时间和季节变化。我们在一年中三个不同的季节，在赖布尔市的 10 个不同地点连续三天记录了街头牛的觅食行为，每天 48 个时间点。我们对时间序列数据进行了对数转换，并使用单余弦函数来计算觅食活动中一天中时间变化的特征。我们还确定了“时间”和“季节”因素对觅食行为和牛数量的影响。我们发现觅食模式在一天中的时间变化具有统计学意义，峰值主要位于中午，与季节无关。与雨季和冬季相比，夏季觅食幅度最小。“一天中的时间”和“季节”因素在统计学上显着地调节了牛在街上的觅食活动和频率。观察到的牛在街头觅食行为的时空模式可能为参与减轻赖布尔市和世界其他地方的城市牛威胁的利益相关者提供有用的信息。