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Territory and group sizes in Eurasian beavers (Castor fiber): echoes of settlement and reproduction?

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Abstract

According to current theories of territoriality, an animal is expected to defend the smallest area that can provide resources for maximisation of reproduction, known as the ‘economically defendable’ area. In group territorial species however, the strategies behind resource defence are likely to be more complex with corporate territoriality, cooperative breeding, delayed dispersal and intra-group competition all potentially playing a role. Here we examined group territoriality in a social herbivorous rodent, the Eurasian beaver Castor fiber. Beavers in our study do not inhabit economically defendable territories. Instead the sequence of arrival of pairs into unoccupied areas seems to play a more important role in determining the size of the territory, whereas group size is determined by past reproductive success. We argue that the settlement pattern and reproductive history have a lasting impact in the territorial system of beavers due to a combination of the low adult mortality, high dispersal costs, and avoidance of resource depletion.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Staatsbosbeheer and especially Dirk Fey for logistic support, and Jon M. Arnemo, Roy de Beijer, Frode Bergan, Erik Boereboom, Mieuw van Diedenhoven, Bjørnar Hovde, Birgit Ranheim, Fiona Sharpe, Liat Romme Thomsen, and Bart Weel for excellent help in the field. Ruben van de Brink and Jan Vink collected the scent marking data in the Biesbosch in 1998, and we thank Freek Niewold (Alterra) for permission to use these data. We thank Diana Bell, and Andrew Watkinson for supervision, Ian Lake and Harald Klempe for GIS support, Odd Vevle for botanical knowledge, Paul Johnson for statistical advice and Paul Johnson, Hanna Kokko, Dominic Johnson and two anonymous referees for comments on earlier drafts of the manuscript. The study was financially supported by IBN-DLO, Staatsbosbeheer, the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, and Telemark University College. This is publication 3546 of the Netherlands Institute of Ecology and publication 386 of the Centre for Wetland Ecology. The experiments comply with the current laws of the country in which they were performed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biological Sciences, University of East Anglia, NR4 7TJ, UK

    Ruairidh D. Campbell

  2. Present address: Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, University of Oxford, Tubney House, Abingdon Road, Tubney, OX13 5QL, UK

    Ruairidh D. Campbell

  3. Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Department of Environmental and Health Studies, Telemark University College, N-3800, Norway

    Frank Rosell

  4. Bø i Telemark and Department of Zoology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway

    Frank Rosell

  5. Department of Plant-Animal Interactions, Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW), PO Box 1299, NL-3600, BG Maarssen, The Netherlands

    Bart A. Nolet

  6. Vereniging voor Zoogdierkunde en Zoogdierbescherming (VZZ), Oude Kraan 8, NL-6811, LJ, Arnhem, The Netherlands

    Vilmar A. A. Dijkstra

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  1. Ruairidh D. Campbell
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  2. Frank Rosell
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Correspondence to Frank Rosell.

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Communicated by E. Korpimäki

R.D. Campbell and F. Rosell contributed equally to this work

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Campbell, R.D., Rosell, F., Nolet, B.A. et al. Territory and group sizes in Eurasian beavers (Castor fiber): echoes of settlement and reproduction?. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 58, 597–607 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-005-0942-6

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