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| Image: John Berini |
From BMCSeries blog
by John Berini and Catherine Badgley
John is a PhD candidate in the Department of Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at the University of Minnesota and U-M EEB alumnus (MS EEB 2010). Catherine is a University of Michigan professor of ecology and evolutionary biology
Large mammals like bison often show substantial disparity in size between the sexes. These size differences can also result in other differences in behaviour. In this guest blog, John Berini and Catherine Badgley discuss their new research, recently published in BMC Ecology, that examines how differences in diet can cause male and female bison to become spatially segregated during certain times of the year.
In mammals, sexes often differ in adult body size, with adult males being substantially larger than their female counterparts. This variation in body size can lead to significant differences in nutritional requirements, a phenomenon commonly referred to as diet segregation. Females, due to their smaller size and shorter digestive tract, tend to process food more rapidly than males do, and as a result, require higher quality food. Because of their larger size, males are more efficient at converting low-quality food into usable energy, and thus, are more concerned with quantity.