Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear
Using photos of captive Andean bears of known age and pedigree, and photos of wild Andean bear cubs <6 months old, we evaluated the degree to which visual information may be used to estimate bears’ ages and assess their kinship. We demonstrate that the ages of Andean bear cubs ≤6 months old may b...
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| Format: | Online |
| Language: | English |
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PeerJ Inc.
2015
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| Online Access: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4512767/ |
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pubmed-45127672015-07-24 Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear Van Horn, Russell C. Zug, Becky Appleton, Robyn D. Velez-Liendo, Ximena Paisley, Susanna LaCombe, Corrin Animal Behavior Using photos of captive Andean bears of known age and pedigree, and photos of wild Andean bear cubs <6 months old, we evaluated the degree to which visual information may be used to estimate bears’ ages and assess their kinship. We demonstrate that the ages of Andean bear cubs ≤6 months old may be estimated from their size relative to their mothers with an average error of <0.01 ± 13.2 days (SD; n = 14), and that ages of adults ≥10 years old may be estimated from the proportion of their nose that is pink with an average error of <0.01 ± 3.5 years (n = 41). We also show that similarity among the bears’ natural markings, as perceived by humans, is not associated with pedigree kinship among the bears (R2 < 0.001, N = 1,043, p = 0.499). Thus, researchers may use photos of wild Andean bears to estimate the ages of young cubs and older adults, but not to infer their kinship. Given that camera trap photos are one of the most readily available sources of information on large cryptic mammals, we suggest that similar methods be tested for use in other poorly understood species. PeerJ Inc. 2015-07-16 /pmc/articles/PMC4512767/ /pubmed/26213647 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.1042 Text en © 2015 Van Horn et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited. |
| repository_type |
Open Access Journal |
| institution_category |
Foreign Institution |
| institution |
US National Center for Biotechnology Information |
| building |
NCBI PubMed |
| collection |
Online Access |
| language |
English |
| format |
Online |
| author |
Van Horn, Russell C. Zug, Becky Appleton, Robyn D. Velez-Liendo, Ximena Paisley, Susanna LaCombe, Corrin |
| spellingShingle |
Van Horn, Russell C. Zug, Becky Appleton, Robyn D. Velez-Liendo, Ximena Paisley, Susanna LaCombe, Corrin Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear |
| author_facet |
Van Horn, Russell C. Zug, Becky Appleton, Robyn D. Velez-Liendo, Ximena Paisley, Susanna LaCombe, Corrin |
| author_sort |
Van Horn, Russell C. |
| title |
Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear |
| title_short |
Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear |
| title_full |
Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear |
| title_fullStr |
Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear |
| title_full_unstemmed |
Photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of Andean bear |
| title_sort |
photos provide information on age, but not kinship, of andean bear |
| description |
Using photos of captive Andean bears of known age and pedigree, and photos of wild Andean bear cubs <6 months old, we evaluated the degree to which visual information may be used to estimate bears’ ages and assess their kinship. We demonstrate that the ages of Andean bear cubs ≤6 months old may be estimated from their size relative to their mothers with an average error of <0.01 ± 13.2 days (SD; n = 14), and that ages of adults ≥10 years old may be estimated from the proportion of their nose that is pink with an average error of <0.01 ± 3.5 years (n = 41). We also show that similarity among the bears’ natural markings, as perceived by humans, is not associated with pedigree kinship among the bears (R2 < 0.001, N = 1,043, p = 0.499). Thus, researchers may use photos of wild Andean bears to estimate the ages of young cubs and older adults, but not to infer their kinship. Given that camera trap photos are one of the most readily available sources of information on large cryptic mammals, we suggest that similar methods be tested for use in other poorly understood species. |
| publisher |
PeerJ Inc. |
| publishDate |
2015 |
| url |
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4512767/ |
| _version_ |
1613251411158499328 |