Seokmin Kim

Forest elephant seed dispersal potential
2017-2019 (Beirne et al., 2019; Poulsen et al., 2022)

Forest elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis) are the largest, fruit eating animals in many parts of Africa. By dispersing seeds long distances, these animals greatly influence plant population spread and community dynamics. Estimating seed dispersal potential depends mainly on 1) gut passage time and 2) movement patterns. I was involved with a project that first measured the gut passage time of wild forest elephants (Beirne et al., 2019) and one that used this data to model their dispersal potential (Poulsen et al., 2022). To measure gut passage time, I helped feed a GPS collared elephant colored beads and modified seeds that measure the ambient temperature and then tracked it across the jungles of Gabon. Through this effort, we calculated the first ever gut passage time estimates from wild forest elephants (mean = 39.8 hrs, 16.6 – 113.7 hrs range). Then by incorporating this information with movement data from 96 other GPS collared individuals, we simulated that elephants dispersed seeds 5.3 kms on average, with the longest simulated distance being 101 km.

Distribution of gut passage times (left) and simulated movement patterns of six of the 96 GPT collared elephants used in the study (right). Poulsen et al., 2022.