A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Science, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. Johannesburg, 2013. / Species richness and estimates of species richness were calculated based on assemblages of bats,
within the biomes of South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland following the vegetation classification of Mucina
and Rutherford (2006). Similarity indices were used to explore the various relationships between the
assemblages between the various biomes. Taxonomic diversity and distinctness examined the various
assemblages within each of the biomes to investigate which biomes contained assemblages that were
taxonomically diverse and/or taxonomically distinct compared to all species known to occur within South
Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland.
The Desert biome had the lowest recorded species richness (5 species), and there was insufficient data
to calculate estimates of species richness for this biome. While the Albany had 11 species recorded with
species estimates (Est.) ranging between 11-12, then in increasing order - Nama-Karoo (12 species, Est.
13-25 species), Succulent-Karoo (13 species, Est. 15-30 species), Fynbos (17 species, Est. 18-25
species), Indian Ocean Coastal Belt (31 species, Est. 32-36 species), Forest (32 species, Est. 37-46
species), Grassland (39 species, Est. 42-54 species), Azonal (45 species, Est. 49-63 species) and
Savanna (57 species, Est. 59-67 species). The mean recorded estimates (based on the averages of all
models) and rounding up to a full species indicates that the Albany biome contains the lowest expected
species richness of 12 species, then Fynbos and Nama-Karoo (21 species), Succulent-Karoo (22
species), Indian Ocean Coastal Belt (34 species), Forest (43 species), Grassland (49 species), Azonal
(54 species) and Savanna (64 species).
Sample completeness was calculated for each of the biomes which indicates in ascending order that the
Albany biome is 93.2% complete followed by the Indian Ocean Coastal Belt biome (91.1%), Savanna
biome (89.9%), Azonal biome (84.1%), Fynbos biome (81.5%), Grassland biome (80.7%), Forest biome
(75.8%), Succulent-Karoo biome (61.3%), and Nama-Karoo biome (59.9%). This showed that the Albany
biome was found to be the only biome that has been sufficiently sampled.
The Jaccard and Sørensen pair wise indices resulted in the clustering of the biomes with similar species
richness, due to the large range in species richness (5-57 species) between the biomes. The Lennon et
al. (2001) index which is not affected by large species richness between the samples indicated that the
Desert and Nama-Karoo assemblages were most dissimilar to one another, while the Indian Ocean
Coastal Belt assemblage was the most similar to the remaining biome assemblages. The Albany biome
assemblage and Azonal biome assemblage were shown to the most dissimilar to one another.
The Grassland, Nama-Karoo and Savanna biomes contribute to higher taxonomic diversity, while the
Albany, Azonal, Fynbos, Nama-Karoo and Succulent-Karoo biomes contain lower species richness
generally but represent a higher taxonomic distinctness from the chiroptera assemblages in the
Grassland and Savanna biomes. The Desert, Forest and Indian Ocean Coastal Belt biomes do not
iv
contain bat assemblages that are neither taxonomically distinct nor diverse when compared to the taxa of
South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland.
The bat assemblage within the Nama-Karoo are both taxonomically diverse and distinct from chiroptera
assemblages found within the other nine biomes, requiring a greater focus on conservation actions for
the bat species assemblage located within this biome.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:wits/oai:wiredspace.wits.ac.za:10539/13420 |
| Date | 09 January 2014 |
| Creators | Seamark, Ernest C.J. |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
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