Pasture feeding associations of european white stork Ciconia Ciconia Ciconia with herbivorous mammals and agricultural machinery: historical and geographical aspects

На основе обширных литературных данных и авторского материала представлен детальный анализ современного географического распространения пастбищных кормовых ассоциаций европейского белого аиста Ciconia ciconia ciconia с крупными травоядными млекопитающими и сельскохозяйственной техникой. Ассоциации белого аиста с землеобрабатывающей и уборочной сельскохозяйственной техникой оцениваются как антропогенные модификации кормового поведения. Рассмотрен историко-географический аспект происхождения кормовых ассоциаций белого аиста с дикими травоядными млекопитающими и домашним скотом. Предложена гипотеза независимого африканского, ближневосточного и европейского происхождения пастбищных кормовых ассоциаций белого аиста. Based on the extensive literature review and original observations, a detailed analysis of the modern geographical distribution of pasture forage associations of the European white stork Ciconia ciconia ciconia with large herbivorous mammals and agricultural machinery is presented. Associations of the white stork with land and harvesting agricultural machinery are evaluated as anthropogenic modifications of forage behavior. The historical and geographical aspect of the origin of feedingr associations of the white stork with wild herbivorous mammals and livestock is considered. The hypothesis of independent African, Middle Eastern and European origin of pasture forage associations of the white stork is proposed.

Microbial biogeography of the wombat gastrointestinal tract

Most herbivorous mammals have symbiotic microbes living in their gastrointestinal tracts that help with harvesting energy from recalcitrant plant fibre. The bulk of research into these microorganisms has focused on samples collected from faeces, representing the distal region of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. However, the GI tract in herbivorous mammals is typically long and complex, containing different regions with distinct physico-chemical properties that can structure resident microbial communities. In this study, we characterised the microbial biogeography of the GI tracts in individuals of two species of wombats.Using 16S rRNA gene sequencing, our results show that GI microbial communities of wombats are structured by GI region. For both the bare-nosed wombat (Vombatus ursinus) and the southern hairy-nosed wombat (Lasiorhinus latifrons), we observed a trend of increasing microbial diversity from stomach to distal colon. The microbial composition in the first proximal colon region was more similar between wombat species than the corresponding distal colon region in the same species. We found several microbial genera that were differentially abundant between the first proximal colon and distal colon regions. Surprisingly, only 99 (10.6%) and 204 (18.7%) amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) were shared between the first proximal colon region and the distal colon region for the bare-nosed and southern hairy-nosed wombat, respectively.These results suggest that microbial communities in the first proximal colon region—the putative site of primary plant fermentation in wombats—are distinct from the distal colon, and that faecal samples may have limitations in capturing the diversity of these communities. While faeces are still a valuable and effective means of characterising the distal colon microbiota, future work seeking to better understand how GI microbiota impact the energy economy of wombats (and potentially other hindgut-fermenting mammals) may need to take gut biogeography into account.

The plant secondary compound swainsonine reshapes gut microbiota in plateau pikas (Ochotona curzoniae)

Plants produce various plant secondary compounds (PSCs) to deter the foraging of herbivorous mammals. However, little is known about whether PSCs can reshape gut microbiota and promote gut homeostasis of hosts. Using 16S rDNA sequencing to investigate the effects of PSCs on the gut microbiota of small herbivorous mammals, we studied plateau pikas (Ochotona curzoniae) fed diets containing swainsonine (SW) extracted from Oxytropis ochrocephala. Our results showed that both long- and short-term treatment of a single artificial diet in the laboratory significantly reduced alpha diversity and significantly affected beta diversity, core bacteria abundance, and bacterial functions in pikas. After SW was added to the artificial diet, the alpha diversity significantly increased in the long-term treatment, and core bacteria (e.g., Akkermansiaceae) with altered relative abundances in the two treatments showed no significant difference compared with pikas in the wild. The complexity of the co-occurrence network structure was reduced in the artificial diet, but it increased after SW was added in both treatments. Further, the abundances of bacteria related to altered alanine, aspartate, and glutamate metabolism in the artificial diet were restored in response to SW. SW further decreased the concentration of short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) in both treatments. Our results suggest that PSCs play a key role in regulating gut microbiota community and intestinal homeostasis, thereby maintaining host health. Key points • Swainsonine improves the intestinal bacterial diversity of plateau pikas. • Swainsonine promotes the recovery of core bacterial abundances in the gut of plateau pikas. • Swainsonine promotes the restoration of intestinal bacterial functions of plateau pikas.

Use of efficient microorganisms in agriculture

The interest in the use of microorganisms in agricultural practices has increased significantly in recent years, both in the promotion of plant growth and in the biological control of plant pests and diseases. This literature review work aimed to address information on the use of isolation, multiplication, use and storage methodologies for efficient microorganisms (Effective Microorganisms, EM) in agriculture. These microorganisms have important functions for their hosts, as they have symbiotic interactions with them, and are capable of protecting plants from attack by insects, diseases and herbivorous mammals through the production of toxins. The use of EM in agriculture aims to accelerate the natural composition of organic matter and promote the balance of microbial flora contributing to plant development. EMs are potential substitutes for chemical products, and can thus favor the preservation of the environment. They are collected from fertile forest soils through simple and inexpensive methodologies, consisting of a tool with potential to be used both by family farmers and on a small and large scale. They can be used in different ways, the main ones being in soil, plant, water and animals. The use of EM is an accessible and low-cost technique, in addition to being easy to prepare within the property itself, contributing to the sustainability of agricultural systems.

CH4/CO2 Ratios and Carbon Isotope Enrichment Between Diet and Breath in Herbivorous Mammals

Breath and diet samples were collected from 29 taxa of animals at the Zurich and Basel Zoos to characterize the carbon isotope enrichment between breath and diet. Diet samples were measured for δ13C and breath samples for CH4/CO2 ratios and for the respired component of δ13C using the Keeling plot approach. Different digestive physiologies included coprophagous and non-coprophagous hindgut fermenters, and non-ruminant and ruminant foregut fermenters. Isotope enrichments from diet to breath were 0.8 ± 0.9‰, 3.5 ± 0.8‰, 2.3 ± 0.4‰, and 4.1 ± 1.0‰, respectively. CH4/CO2 ratios were strongly correlated with isotope enrichments for both hindgut and foregut digestive strategies, although CH4 production was not the sole reason for isotope enrichment. Average CH4/CO2 ratios per taxon ranged over several orders of magnitude from 10–5 to 10–1. The isotope enrichment values for diet-breath can be used to further estimate the isotope enrichment from diet-enamel because Passey et al. (2005b) found a nearly constant isotope enrichment for breath-enamel for diverse mammalian taxa. The understanding of isotope enrichment factors from diet to breath and diet to enamel will have important applications in the field of animal physiology, and possibly also for wildlife ecology and paleontology.

Do faecal samples represent the primary site of microbial plant fermentation in hindgut fermenters?

BackgroundMost herbivorous mammals have symbiotic microbes living in their gastrointestinal tracts that help with harvesting energy from recalcitrant plant fibre. The bulk of research into these microorganisms has focused on samples collected from faeces, representing the distal region of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. However, the GI tract in herbivorous mammals is typically long and complex, containing different regions with distinct physico-chemical properties that can structure resident microbial communities. Therefore, to determine how representative faeces are to other regions of the GI tract in hindgut-fermenting mammals, we characterised the microbial biogeography of the GI tract of two species of wombats.ResultsUsing 16S rRNA gene sequencing, our results show that GI microbial communities of wombats are structured by GI region. For both the bare-nosed wombat (Vombatus ursinus) and the southern hairy-nosed wombat (Lasiorhinus latifrons), we observed a trend of increasing microbial diversity from stomach to distal colon. The microbial composition in the first proximal colon region was more similar between wombat species than the corresponding distal colon region in the same species. We found several microbial genera that were differentially abundant between the first proximal colon and distal colon regions. Surprisingly, only 99 (10.6%) and 204 (18.7%) amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) were shared between the first proximal colon region and the distal colon region for the bare-nosed and southern hairy-nosed wombat, respectively. ConclusionThese results suggest that microbial communities in the first proximal colon region—the putative site of primary plant fermentation in wombats—are distinct from the distal colon, and that faecal samples have limitations in capturing the diversity of these communities. While faeces are still a valuable and effective means of characterising the distal colon microbiota, future work seeking to better understand how GI microbes impact the energy economy of wombats (and potentially other hindgut-fermenting mammals) may need to take gut biogeography into account.

Comparative Genomics Reveals a Convergent Signature on the Vitamin D Receptor (VDR) in Herbivorous Mammals

Background: Dietary adaptation is one of hot topics in adaptive evolution of mammals. Herbivorous mammals generally digest structural carbohydrates (such as cellulose and hemicellulose) via intestinal microbial fermentation. However, the mechanism by which the host supports the intestinal fermentation capacity is still not well understood. To address this question, we conducted convergent amino acid scanning to identify candidate genes involving intestinal fermentation across mammalian phylogeny. Results: Among 4886 one-to-one orthologous genes, we found that 122 genes showed a significant increase of convergent signature in two foregut-fermenting families (Cercopithecidae: Rhinopithecus roxellana, Bovidae: Bos taurus and Ovis aries ) and particularly, in the vitamin D receptor (VDR), a convergent cysteine to serine substitution at amino acid 410 (VDR C410S) occurred in 14 mammalian families with intestinal fermentation capacity. As a critical role of VDR in the regulation of intestinal microbes and adaptive immunity, we employed phylogenetically independent contrast analysis to test whether the evolution of the VDR gene influenced intestinal fermentation and found this convergent amino acid substitution (VDR C410S) possess significant positively correlations with the intestinal fermentation capacity and the dietary components (plant parts except for fruits, seeds and nectar) consumed by 107 mammalian species, which indicated VDR have a positive impact on the herbivorous adaptation of intestinal fermentation. Conclusions: Our results suggest that nuclear receptor gene VDR involved in intestinal adaptive immune show rapid adaptive fixation of convergent amino acid substitutions (C410S) among herbivorous mammals with convergent methodology.

CT-Informed Skull Osteology of Palaeolagus haydeni (Mammalia: Lagomorpha) and Its Bearing on the Reconstruction of the Early Lagomorph Body Plan

Lagomorpha is a clade of herbivorous mammals nested within Euarchontoglires, one of the major placental groups represented today. It comprises two extant families with markedly different body plans: the long-eared and long-limbed Leporidae (hares and rabbits) and the short-eared and short-limbed Ochotonidae (pikas). These two lagomorph lineages diverged probably during the latest Eocene/early Oligocene, but it is unclear whether the last common ancestor of crown lagomorphs was more leporid- or more ochotonid-like in morphology. Palaeolagus, an early lagomorph dominant in western North America from the late Eocene to Oligocene is of particular importance for addressing this controversy. Here, we present new and comprehensive data on the cranial anatomy of Palaeolagus haydeni, the type species for the genus, based on micro-computed tomography (μCT). Our μCT data allow us to confirm, revise and score for the very first time the states of several leporid-like and ochotonid-like characters in the skull of Palaeolagus. This mixed cranial architecture differentiates Palaeolagus from the crown groups of Lagomorpha and supports its phylogenetic status as a stem taxon.

Signatures of landscape and captivity in the gut microbiota of Southern Hairy-nosed Wombats (Lasiorhinus latifrons)

Background Herbivorous mammals co-opt microbes to derive energy and nutrients from diets that are recalcitrant to host enzymes. Recent research has found that captive management—an important conservation tool for many species—can alter the gut microbiota of mammals. Such changes could negatively impact the ability of herbivorous mammals to derive energy from their native diets, and ultimately reduce host fitness. To date, nothing is known of how captivity influences the gut microbiota of the Southern Hairy-nosed Wombat (SHNW), a large herbivorous marsupial that inhabits South Australia. Here, using 16S rRNA gene sequencing, we characterized the faecal microbiota of SHNWs in captivity and from three wild populations, two from degraded habitats and one from an intact native grass habitat. Results We found that captive SHNWs had gut microbiota that were compositionally different and less diverse compared to wild SHNWs. There were major differences in gut microbiota community membership between captive and wild animals, both in statistically significant changes in relative abundance of microbes, and in the presence/absence of microbes. We also observed differences in microbial composition between wild populations, with the largest difference associated with native vs. degraded habitat. Conclusions These results suggest that captivity has a major impact on the gut microbiota of SHNWs, and that different wild populations harbour distinct microbial compositions. Such findings warrant further work to determine what impacts these changes have on the fitness of SHNWs, and whether they could be manipulated to improve future management of the species.

Translocating Mycobacterium ulcerans: An experimental model

Mycobacterium ulcerans is a non-tuberculous environmental mycobacterium responsible for extensive cutaneous and subcutaneous ulcers in mammals, known as Buruli ulcer in humans. M. ulcerans has seldom been detected in the faeces of mammals and has not been detected in human faeces. Nevertheless, the detection and isolation of M. ulcerans in animal faeces does not fit with the current epidemiological schemes for the disease. Here, using an experimental model in which rats were fed with 109 colony-forming units of M. ulcerans, we detected M. ulcerans DNA in the faeces of challenged rats for two weeks and along their digestive tract for 10 days. M. ulcerans DNA was further detected in the lymphatic system including in the cervical and axillary lymph nodes and the spleen, but not in any other tissue including healthy and broken skin, 10 days post-challenge. These observations indicate that in some herbivorous mammals, M. ulcerans contamination by the digestive route may precede translocation and limited contamination of the lymphatic tissues without systemic infection. These herbivorous mammals may be sources of M. ulcerans for exposed populations but are unlikely to be reservoirs for the pathogen.