Amboseli National Park in Kenya, East Africa, is an ideal testing ground for investigating both how seasonality of temperature and precipitation influence temporal and spatial heterogeneity of ecosystems and how species respond to seasonal resource availability. The park is a semi-arid savannah ecosystem, with diverse habitats ranging from grasslands to dense woodlands to swamps. The mammalian fauna of the park is species rich and highly responsive to the seasonality of precipitation that defines the regional environment. Large herbivorous mammals fall into two dietary categories: browsers (feeding mostly on leaves) and grazers (feeding mostly on grasses); and two categories related to their water uptake: water-independent (obtaining water from food) and water-dependent species (obtaining water by drinking).
Our research in Amboseli National Park has focused on wildebeest and zebra, both water-dependent grazers. In 2010, in collaboration with Dr. Behrensmeyer from the Smithsonian Institute, Dr. Badgley collected teeth from over 80 individual zebra and wildebeest skeletons as part of a long-term study comparing bone assemblages to censused living populations. Isotopic analyses by then-doctoral student Tara Smiley on a sub-set of teeth from each species created seasonality profiles by gender and age in water utilization and diet.
Dr. Badgley and Tara Smiley returned to Amboseli in 2011 to collect water and grass samples from different sources in the park. While in the field, scientists from the Kenyan Wildlife Survey were trained in sampling methods, and grass and water samples were continually collected twice monthly over a one-year period. Isotopic analyses of these samples aim to generate data on the seasonal and spatial isotopic variation of resources available zebra and wildebeest in the park. These data will be used to constrain input values for modeling tooth-isotope systems, and to better understand seasonal patterns of water utilization and diet recorded in stable isotopes.
Dr. Badgley has also worked with former postdoc Dr. Soledad Domingo to establish long-term bone surveys in Doñana National Park, southeastern Spain. The Park encompasses a variety of habitats, with survey transects established along beaches, sand dunes, scrubland, and marshes. The LiveDeadFossil project is the first such long-term survey in a coastal Mediterranean ecosystem.
