Alpine marmot
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Alpine marmot ( Marmota marmota ) |
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The Alpine marmot ( Marmota marmota ), also Mankei or Murmel in southern Germany and Austria , is a rodent that is particularly widespread in the Alps . It is the third largest rodent found in Europe after the beaver and the porcupine . Young animals of the Alpine marmot usually reach sexual maturity in the third year and then leave their family unit at the earliest. Due to this late migration of the young, marmots live together socially in groups that can contain up to 20 individuals.
Alpine marmots are typical representatives of an Ice Age fauna that was also found in the European lowlands during the Pleistocene . A hibernation lasting six to seven months enabled them to survive in this habitat . During hibernation they live exclusively on the body's own fat reserves, parasites living in the intestine are rejected. Today, marmots, as so-called Ice Age relics, are limited in their distribution to mountain heights, as only here can they find suitable environmental conditions. During this colonization of the high Alps, the alpine marmot lost most of its genetic diversity due to a bottle neck effect and was unable to rebuild it due to its lifestyle, which was adapted to the Ice Age. The Alpine marmot is therefore one of the animals with the lowest genetic diversity.
Appearance
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There is no noticeable difference between female and male Alpine marmots that allows the sexes to be distinguished from one another during field observations. Males tend to be slightly larger and heavier.
The animals have a head body length of about forty to fifty centimeters. The tail length is ten to twenty centimeters. The weight fluctuates over the course of the year. Healthy, adult males weigh at least three kilograms. The weight of the females is slightly less.
The head is blackish and gray with a light muzzle. The ears are small and hairy. The fur consists of thick, strong guard hairs and an undercoat of shorter, somewhat wavy hair. The coat color is basically very variable. The back can be slate gray, light brown or reddish brown, the underside of the body is usually more yellowish in color. Occasionally there are also individuals with a blackish-looking fur. The fur is changed once a year. In most individuals, this change of coat takes place in June.
The muscular and strong shoulder girdle and the pronounced grave paws are striking in the body structure of the Alpine marmot. The front legs are a little shorter than the rear legs. The front feet have four toes and the rear feet have five. Alpine marmots are sole walkers, the soles of their feet have well-formed pads and are hairless.
distribution and habitat
The natural range of the alpine marmot includes the Alps , the Carpathian Mountains and the High Tatras , although the marmot is nowhere to be found everywhere. Humans have also settled the Alpine marmot in various places. The areas whose marmot populations are based on releases include certain regions of the Eastern Alps and the Pyrenees . There is even a small colony in the Black Forest .
The altitudes at which most of the Alpine marmots are found range from the respective local tree line to around 200 meters above sea level. Marmots also use cleared areas below the tree line, which humans keep permanently free of trees. However, they do not fall below certain altitudes and can only be observed from an altitude of at least 800 meters. In good marmot areas 40 to 80 marmots live on one square kilometer.
Alpine marmots are able to cope with extreme alpine conditions and colonize alpine meadows right up to the foot of glaciers. They occasionally reach altitudes of 3000 meters. A suitable habitat must have alpine lawns, as only here will they find sufficient food plants. It must also provide a deep floor that enables the marmots to build their extensive burrows. They prefer exposed slopes to the south, as these are most likely free of snow in spring. On such slopes, the growing season begins earlier and lasts longer.
food
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Roots , later leaves and flowers of a number of herbs and grasses serve as food in early spring . Alpine marmots rarely suffer from a lack of food during the summer months. They only use part of the food available and even benefit from cattle grazing on the alpine mats on which they stay , as this encourages fresh new plant growth. Food intake, on the other hand, is limited by other factors: marmots quickly suffer from overheating and therefore spend a large part of the day in the cooler burrow on warm days. Repeated disturbances from predators or humans also limit the time they can spend eating.
Alpine marmots prefer low-cellulose young shoots and flowers as food. Immediately after hibernation, they eat all available fresh shoots without specific selection. However, as the food supply increases, they specialize in certain plants. These include the Alpine clover , several species of Astragalus , cleavers , lovage , alpine and mountain plantain . Research has shown that these preferred plants are particularly rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids . These ingredients cannot be generated independently by the mammalian organism. However, a higher concentration of essential fatty acids in the white adipose tissue of hibernators enables them to withstand lower body temperatures during hibernation.
behavior
The family association
The diurnal alpine marmots usually live in groups, each of which is based on an adult pair. Descendants of different age groups usually live with this couple, so that the individual marmot group consists of a family that includes up to 20 individuals. Both males and females each have their own ranking - the territorial pair is only dominant over the same-sex animals. An adult, alien male is driven away by the highest ranking male, a female by the highest ranking female, if they penetrate the territory of the family group. Only young animals are occasionally tolerated if the family association itself has offspring of this age. Within the family group, the animals spend a lot of time grooming each other and having playful romps.
The size of the area is around 2.5 hectares. These are real territories. At best, a single area overlaps at its edges with that of another family group. The territorial boundaries are each marked by the two highest-ranking animals. They secrete an intensely smelling secretion from their cheek glands, with which they regularly mark conspicuous spots within their territory. Males also regularly walk through their territorial boundaries. What is striking is the regular flicking up and down with the tail.
The construction
Large marmot burrows that have been built over several generations usually have a widely ramified system of chambers and tunnels. Such burrows usually consist of three different types of construction: In addition to short escape tubes with only one or two entrances, there are summer burrows whose nest chambers are often only one to one and a half meters below the ground. The escape tubes allow retreat as soon as an enemy approaches. The summer buildings are also used to evade the heat of the day. The most important part of the building, however, is the winter building, the nest chambers of which are much deeper than those of the summer building. On slopes they can be up to seven meters below the surface of the earth. In addition to nest chambers, all burrows also have caves that are used all year round to deposit excrement.
All age groups and both males and females are busy building and maintaining their den. Marmots first loosen the earth with their front legs or teeth and then scrape the earth outwards with vigorous movements of their hind legs. The excavated material piles up in the vicinity of the buildings to form mounds that can contain several cubic meters in volume.
Adaptations to the environmental conditions of the habitat
Heat stress
Alpine marmots are well adapted to the cool mountainous locations and are more likely to be exposed to heat stress . During the warmest hours on hot summer days, they are mostly in their cool burrows. They can occasionally be seen stretched out in the sun in front of their burrows. However, this behavior does not serve to increase their body temperature, but rather helps to reduce the number of parasites in their fur. During these sun baths, you assume an outstretched posture. In this way, they have extensive contact with the cooler substrate and can thus keep their body temperature low.
The risk of heat stress also means that Alpine marmots generally do not occur below 800 m . Investigations into the course of the day of marmots have shown that the closer to the valley, the more time the marmots spend in the burrow during the day. This reduces the time that the animals can spend in order to eat enough food reserves for wintering. Even if valleys seem to offer ideal habitat properties, marmots are no longer able to build up enough fat reserves here to survive hibernation.
Hibernation
The common hibernation , in which the animals lose up to a third of their body weight, is held from October to March. They thus outlast the period in which a thick blanket of snow usually prevents them from finding enough to eat. However, the trigger of hibernation is not the decline in available food, but it is endogenously controlled by an internal time of year. Waking up from hibernation is also not regulated by external stimuli.
Hibernation is preceded by a phase in which the marmots carry dry and dead plant parts into the nest chambers. This material is used to cushion and isolate the nest chamber and does not represent a supply of food. The entrance to the burrow in which the Alpine marmots spend their sleep is closed from the inside with a plug up to two meters long made of grass, excrement , earth and stones.
Hibernation is interrupted every three to four weeks in order to remove feces and urine .
Compared to adult marmots, young animals have a lower chance of surviving hibernation unscathed, as they only have a maximum of three months to build up appropriate fat reserves after being weaned from their mother's milk. As a rule, they have only built up 60% of the body fat reserves with which adult animals go into hibernation for six to seven months. Even adult marmots have a high winter mortality rate when the weather conditions do not allow them to build up adequate fat reserves. Females who have given birth are particularly at risk. The daily weight loss during hibernation also depends on the size of the group that hibernates together. Mortality is lowest in groups in which young animals overwinter with their parents and older siblings. In hibernation groups that only consist of parents and their first litter, often everyone dies during hibernation.
Reproduction
Mating behavior
The mating season begins after wintering in April / May and lasts about two weeks. Only the highest-ranking female in the family unit is able to reproduce. Although subdominant females also become pregnant, battles of rank with the dominant female, which take place especially in the first three weeks of the pregnancy phase, increase the concentration of glucocorticoids in their blood to such an extent that they either resorb or abort the embryos .
The highest ranking female mates not only with the highest ranking male, but also with subdominant males. Research indicates that the dominant male is not the father in up to 25% of the young. However, the subdominant males are often sons of the dominant male. In many cases they are also offspring of the most senior female, so the degree of inbreeding within a family group can be very high.
The ability for a subdominant male to reproduce is believed to help keep it in the family unit longer. Subdominant female animals migrate from a family unit at an average age of 2.8 years. Males are on average 3.2 years old when they leave their birth group. The dominant male benefits from the whereabouts of the male pups, as the pups are warmed in winter by the male animals of a family group. The more males there are, the greater the chance that the young, most of which are descended from the dominant male, will survive the winter. Lower-ranking males have a small number of direct descendants during the time they remain in the family group, but as "helpers" they pass on their genes indirectly due to a close relationship.
Studies have now shown that even in family associations without subdominant males there are around five percent young animals whose producer is not the highest-ranking male. It is assumed that the highest-ranking female also mates with males from neighboring territories or with migrating male marmots. This could also be observed in the Olympus marmot, a North American species of marmot.
Female marmots do not reproduce every year, but sometimes pause for up to 4 years between two pregnancies. Whether or not you become pregnant after hibernating is largely influenced by your body weight. Female Alpine marmots feed on the fat reserves they built up in the previous year until they are suckling. They are therefore only able to reproduce when their body weight exceeds a minimum weight.
The young animals
After about five weeks of gestation, two to six naked, blind, deaf and toothless cubs are placed. At the time of their birth, they weigh about 30 grams. The average litter consists of four animals. However, if the female is insufficiently nourished, it will usually only carry one young.
Mating takes place immediately after hibernation. Early mating ensures that the young animals have enough time to build up sufficient fat reserves for hibernation. The fat reserves, however, are well below the reserves of adult marmots.
The young animals open their eyes after about 24 days and are suckled by the mother until they leave the burrow (after about six weeks). They leave the burrow for the first time when they are around 40 days old and weigh around 240 grams. At this point they are already able to feed themselves mainly on green fodder and are only occasionally suckled.
The young are sexually mature after the second hibernation at the earliest, but are usually only grown after the third hibernation. Basically, the short summer months only allow a very short growth phase, which delays the onset of sexual maturity: in regions that offer the marmots less favorable environmental conditions, the young animals are only able to reproduce after their fourth hibernation. In any case, they remain in the family unit in which they were born until they reach sexual maturity.
The migration of the young animals
Marmots have only a very small chance of reproducing within the territorial boundaries of their own family unit. For this reason, they do not leave their original association until they are three years old at the earliest in order to found their own family association. However, one third of the three and four year old animals each stay in their family unit for another year. Beyond the age of six, however, no marmot remains as a subdominant animal in its family group.
The migration of males from a family group occurs in animal species of various orders . What is unusual about the marmot is that the females also migrate in search of suitable territory. These migrations are extremely dangerous for the marmots, who normally do not move more than ten to fifteen meters from their nearest burrow. A lack of local knowledge and the lack of shelter means that many of the animals become victims of predators . If they fail to find a partner and a reasonably suitable building, the probability is very high that they will not survive hibernation.
It is characteristic of marmots that they do not primarily fight for territories that are already occupied. Migratory animals are interested in the scent marks that the territory owners have set. As a rule, however, the animals look for unoccupied territories and avoid fights. If it happens anyway, these are conducted with a high level of aggressiveness. The fighting animals can cause serious injuries with their sharp incisor teeth, as a result of which individuals regularly die. A defeated territory owner must migrate. If the other animals in the family group accept the new highest-ranking animal, the change will have no further consequences for them. When the male changes, however, the presence of a new, dominant male leads to an abortion of young animals. Newly born young animals are killed by the male. The infanticide increases the likelihood that the dominant female will become pregnant in the next year.
About fifty percent of the migrating animals actually establish a new territory. Studies in the Berchtesgadener Land have shown that nine percent of the marmot territories are orphaned every year. Migrating animals therefore have a relatively good chance of occupying their own area without disputes with a territory owner.
Predators and parasites
Warning of predators
In older literature it can occasionally be read that Alpine marmots set up special "watchers". That's not the case. It is a misinterpretation of the resting behavior. Marmots like to sit on raised areas such as rocks or the mounds of their ejecta. However, the animals do not take on any specific guardian role. Rather, it warns the animal that first discovers a danger.
When threatened by enemies such as the golden eagle , they warn with high-pitched whistles and then quickly retreat to the underground structures. The whistles can be heard very far. Animals also benefit from the alert calls from family groups in the neighborhood. The Alpine marmots have two different warning calls - a single whistle and a series of several, very short whistles. An entire series of whistles lasts three to five seconds. While there are still indications in the older literature that a single whistle signals a danger from the air, experimental investigations have meanwhile shown that a single whistle indicates an imminent danger such as an eagle already in attack flight. Approaching hikers or a red fox lingering in the area , on the other hand, triggers the series of whistles with which a marmot draws the attention of its fellow species to a potential danger.
The warning call (whistle)
The warning whistle of the alpine marmot recorded on the Berliner Höhenweg , Tyrol, 2006 (the “thundering” are wind noises).
Predators and parasites
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The vigilance of the marmot prevents a large number of the members of the family association from being hit by predators. This is also indicated by the low mortality rate of just five percent, which was found for animals between the ages of two and eight. Marmots of this age are more at risk from not having enough fat reserves to survive long hibernation.
The most dangerous predator for adult marmots is the golden eagle. Golden eagles strike around 70 marmots during the breeding season, which make up up to 80% of the prey. Despite these high prey figures, there is no threat to the population of the marmot: A golden eagle area covers 20 to 90 square kilometers, while marmots in suitable habitats can reach a population density of between 40 and 80 animals per km².
The predators of the Alpine marmots also include pine marten and common raven . However, these are only able to beat young animals. They cannot compete with a fully grown alpine marmot. Even the red fox can only attack a full-grown Alpine marmot if it surprises it from an ambush. He also prefers to hunt young marmots.
Marmots are very common from the tapeworm infected.
Life expectancy
Alpine marmots usually reach an age of 12 years in the wild. Their mortality depends on the life situation. Young animals are exposed to high mortality during their first hibernation. The death rate is also very high for animals that leave their family group to establish their own territory. During their migration to a suitable area, they are very often struck by predators. Individual studies indicate that less than fifty percent survive the winter time if they have not managed to merge with another animal by then. Of the two- to eight-year-old animals that remain in the family, on the other hand, only about 5 percent die each year from predators or during the winter.
Systematics
Marmots (Marmotini) are rodents, members of the squirrel family. The Alpine marmot in particular has a slow evolution rate and therefore differs in fewer base pairings from outgroups, for example compared to humans, than other rodents that have previously been sequenced.
Marmots are actually inhabitants of cold steppes. Accordingly, the Alpine marmot was not only found in the mountains during the Pleistocene Ice Ages, but also in the European lowlands from the Pyrenees to the Ukraine. With the end of the Ice Age, this large area offered less and less habitat for the heat-sensitive Alpine marmots. In the post-ice age only the increasingly less icy Alps and the High Tatras offered the alpine marmot a suitable habitat. The populations in the Alps and in the High Tatras have been separated from each other for probably 25,000 years.
Groundhog as game
The name of the marmot goes back to the Old High German "murmunto", which comes from the Latin Mūs montis ("mountain mouse "). The female marmot is primarily referred to in the hunter language as "cat" , the male as "bear" and young animals as "monkey".
The alpine marmot belongs to the game in parts of its distribution area. While the hunt for the marmot has ceased in Germany , between 7,000 and 8,000 animals are shot in Austria every year. In 2016 , Tyrol achieved 56 percent of the Austrian hunting range with over 4,000 individuals . The hunting seasons are regulated differently in the federal states between August 1st and October 15th.
In Switzerland , the hunting routes have been decreasing since 2009. In 2009 8,300 marmots were shot, in 2015 the figure was 5100. The majority (72 percent) is made up of the canton of Graubünden with around 4,300 animals killed each year. The hunting season in Switzerland lasts from September 1st to October 15th.
Several reasons are given for hunting marmots: In some regions marmots are eaten. This applies, for example, to Graubünden and Vorarlberg . Alpine marmots are also hunted because of their strong incisor teeth, which, like the red deer antlers, are among the hunting trophies . Some alpine farmers try to keep their meadows and alpine pastures free of marmots by hunting, as the burial activity of the marmots, which often scratch several cubic meters of soil from the slopes, makes agricultural work considerably more difficult. As before, also body parts of the marmot in folk medicine used (marble fat) (see also marmot fur ).
protection
The populations in the High Tatras are listed by the European Union in Annexes II and IV of the Habitats Directive under the name Marmota marmota latirostris as a priority species and thus as a species of community interest to be strictly protected, and special protection areas for their conservation by the member states must be reported.
mythology
Alpine marmots play an important role in the Ladin legends of the Fanes kingdom . Moltina, the founder of this empire, made an alliance with the marmots and was even able to transform into such an animal. They would protect their offspring and ensure the welfare of the empire. In return, hunting these animals was taboo. This gave the marmots the character of a totem animal . The great appreciation of the animals is justified with their ability to survive even in inhospitable areas. As late as 1900 the marmots were Untermoi , a Ladin settlement above the Val Badia , not hunted, which from a informant of the folklorist Karl Felix Wolff has been associated with stories from the Fanessage in conjunction.
literature
- Walter Arnold: General biology and way of life of the Alpine marmot (Marmota marmota). In Monika Preleuthner, Gerhard Aubrecht (ed.): Murmeltiere (= catalog of the Upper Austrian National Museum. NF # 146 =. Stapfia. Vol. 63). Biology Center, Linz 1999, ISBN 3-85474-044-1 , pp. 1-20, PDF (2.7 MB) on ZOBODAT
- Walter Arnold, Fredy Frey-Roos: Delayed emigration and community care for boys: Adaptations of the Alpine marmot (Marmota marmota) to ice age living conditions. In Monika Preleuthner, Gerhard Aubrecht (ed.): Murmeltiere (= catalog of the Upper Austrian National Museum. NF # 146 =. Stapfia. Vol. 63). Biology Center, Linz 1999, ISBN 3-85474-044-1 , pp. 33-42, PDF (1.2 MB) on ZOBODAT
- Dmitri Iwanowitsch Bibikow : The marmots of the world. Marmota (= The New Brehm Library. Vol. 388). 2nd, completely revised and expanded edition. West Arp Sciences & Arts a., Magdeburg u. a. 1996, ISBN 3-89432-426-0 .
- Ute Bruns, Fredy Frey-Roos, Thomas Ruf, Walter Arnold: Food ecology of the Alpine marmot (Marmota marmota) and the importance of essential fatty acids. In Monika Preleuthner, Gerhard Aubrecht (ed.): Murmeltiere (= catalog of the Upper Austrian National Museum. NF # 146 =. Stapfia. Vol. 63). Biology Center, Linz 1999, ISBN 3-85474-044-1 , pp. 57-66, PDF (951 kB) on ZOBODAT
- Klaus Hackländer, Ute Bruns, Walter Arnold: Reproduction and mating system in Alpine marmots (Marmota marmota). In Monika Preleuthner, Gerhard Aubrecht (ed.): Murmeltiere (= catalog of the Upper Austrian National Museum. NF # 146 =. Stapfia. Vol. 63). Biology Center, Linz 1999, ISBN 3-85474-044-1 , pp. 21–31, PDF (990 kB) on ZOBODAT
- Monika Preleuthner, Gerhard Aubrecht (Ed.): Marmots (= catalog of the Upper Austrian State Museum. NF No. 146 = Stapfia. Vol. 63). Biology Center, Linz 1999, ISBN 3-85474-044-1 .
- Gossmann et al., 2019, Current Biology 29, 1712-1720, Ice-Age Climate Adaptations Trap the Alpine Marmotin a State of Low Genetic Diversity https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2019.04.020
Web links
- More pictures and information in the nature dictionary
- Alpine marmot - Hribi.net
- spurenjagd.de : Alpine marmot - animal tracks encyclopedia
- Marmota marmota in the Red List of Threatened Species of the IUCN 2006. Posted by: Amori, 1996. Retrieved on May 5, 2006. Since February 2016, this species has been listed as LEAST CONCERN (LC) and not threatened in the Red List. guided..
Individual evidence
- ↑ https://www.br.de/br-fernsehen/sendung/wir-in-bayern/wir-in-bayern-host-mi-mankei100.html , http://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/Mankei
- ↑ Gossmann et al., 2019, Current Biology 29 , 1712–1720 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2019.04.020
- ^ Arnold, p. 6
- ↑ a b c d Arnold, p. 4
- ↑ a b c d Arnold, p. 10
- ↑ Ulrich Hüttmeir, Leopold Slotta-Bachmayr, Norbert Winding: Habitat choice of the Alpine marmot Marmota marmota (Rodentia, Sciuridae): A comparison between the Dachstein plateau and the Hohe Tauern . In Monika Preleuthner, Gerhard Aubrecht (ed.): Murmeltiere (= catalog of the Upper Austrian National Museum. NF # 146 =. Stapfia. Vol. 63). Biology Center, Linz 1999, ISBN 3-85474-044-1 , pp. 67-76, PDF (1.1 MB) on ZOBODAT
- ↑ a b Bruns et al., P. 58
- ↑ Bruns, p. 59
- ↑ Bruns et al., P. 60
- ↑ Bruns et al., P. 64
- ↑ a b Hackländer et al., P. 26
- ^ Arnold, p. 12
- ↑ a b Arnold, p. 13
- ↑ a b Arnold, p. 15
- ↑ a b Arnold, p. 5
- ^ Arnold, p. 9
- ↑ Hackländer et al., P. 25
- ^ Arnold and Frey-Roos, p. 39 f.
- ↑ a b Hackländer et al., P. 23
- ^ A b Arnold and Frey-Roos, p. 37
- ^ Arnold and Frey-Roos, p. 40
- ↑ Hackländer et al., P. 24
- ↑ a b c Arnold, p. 7
- ^ Arnold and Frey-Roos, p. 36
- ↑ Hackländer et al., P. 22
- ↑ a b Hackländer et al., P. 28
- ↑ a b c d Arnold and Frey-Roos, p. 38
- ^ Arnold, p. 14
- ↑ a b Arnold, p. 11
- ^ Arnold and Frey-Roos, p. 39
- ↑ Gossmann et al., 2019, Current Biology 29, 1712–1720 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2019.04.020
- ^ Arnold, p. 3 f.
- ↑ Duden 7 - Etymology - Dictionary of Origin of the German Language . Dudenverlag, 1963, p. 456, search term “marmot”. ISBN 3-411-00907-1 .
- ↑ Statistics Austria: Hunting Year 2015/2016 , accessed on July 29, 2017.
- ↑ Federal Hunting Statistics 2000–2015 , accessed on July 29, 2017.
- ↑ Ulrike Kindl: Critical reading of the Dolomite sagas by Karl Felix Wolff, Volume 2, San Martin de Tor 1997