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Differential responses of non-human primates to seasonal temperature fluctuations

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Abstract

Non-human primates (NHPs) can adapt to conditions outside of their natural habitat and climatic ranges but this can be influenced by inherent evolutionary traits or plasticity of species that evolved in diverse environmental conditions. In this study, we investigated how five species of NHPs that have natural distributions across a range of climatic conditions responded to seasonal temperature changes in a captive environment. The activity levels of NHPs were affected by temperature changes over the season, where activity levels were generally reduced at the lower and higher temperature ranges. Species that are naturally found within narrower and warmer climatic ranges, compared to those found in colder environments with wider fluctuations in temperature, showed more marked changes in activity levels in response to temperature changes. In lower temperature conditions, three out of five species showed significantly lower activity levels; whereas in higher temperature conditions, the activity levels of all species did not significantly decrease. The frequency of thermoregulation behaviours was higher, and use of artificial thermoregulatory sources lower, for species that did not substantially adjust their activity levels in different temperature conditions. Our results suggest that NHPs largely retained the evolutionary traits related to thermoregulation, according to the different ambient conditions they evolved in and may have low behavioural plasticity in adapting to conditions outside of their natural ranges. These results provide insights for improving conservation and captive management and may have implications for understanding NHP resilience to the increasing impact of global climate change.

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Acknowledgement

We wish to thank the management of Guangzhou Zoo for supporting this study and the staff of the primate section for accommodating the logistical arrangements and providing valuable information and knowledge about the primates under their care. We also wish to thank the School of Sociology and Anthropology and the School of Life Sciences at Sun Yat-sen University for their support.

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  1. School of Sociology and Anthropology, Sun Yat-sen University, 135 Xingang West Road, Guangzhou, 510275, China

    John Chih Mun Sha

  2. School of Life Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China

    Heying Du & Junwei Deng

  3. Guangzhou Zoo, Guangzhou, China

    Zujin Chen, Qirui Wu & Wu Chen

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  1. John Chih Mun Sha
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Correspondence to John Chih Mun Sha.

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Sha, J.C.M., Du, H., Deng, J. et al. Differential responses of non-human primates to seasonal temperature fluctuations. Primates 61, 455–464 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10329-020-00801-w

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