Davila Ross, M., and Geissmann, T. (2005). Orangutan long call diversity: A phylogenetic approach. Primate Report 72-1 (Special Issue, Dec. 2005): 17-18 (Abstract only).
Marina Davila Ross1 and
Thomas Geissmann2
1 Institut für Zoologie, Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover,
Germany,
Email: marina.davila-ross@tiho-hannover.de
2 Anthropologisches Institut und Museum, Universität Zürich,
Switzerland
Key Words: orangutans (Pongo spp.), long call, call diversity, phylogeny,
population differences, conservation
The phylogenetic relationships among orangutans on Borneo and Sumatra are controversial,
although - over the past twenty years - several studies have attempted to clarify
orangutan systematics based on DNA sequences and karyological and morphological data.
Surprisingly, few phylogenetic studies used data from wild living orangutans of exactly
known provenance. Furthermore, in most studies of systematics, data from huge geographic
areas (e.g. Sumatra) were pooled in the analyses, thus ignoring possibly distinct
subpopulations. The present study represents a new approach to orangutan systematics,
using orangutan long calls. Long calls are species-specific vocalizations produced
by many nonhuman primates, and data on their acoustical structures have been used
to assess relationships among, and phylogenies of, several primate taxa. We analyzed
78 long calls from wild living orangutans of five populations from Borneo and of
five from Sumatra. Besides the chiefly paraphyletic topology of cladistic results,
which do not conform nor reject a Borneo-Sumatra dichotomy, bootstrap values support
three monophyletic groups (Northwest Borneo: 71-72%, Northeast-East Borneo: 62-75%,
Ketambe: 75-79%). Shortest trees and multivariate analyses provide some support for
a closer relationship among Sumatran and certain Bornean populations than among particular
Bornean populations themselves, indicating that conservation management should be
based on orangutans from different populations rather than on just two island-specific
groups.
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