DOI: 10.5061/dryad.qnk98sfhh
title: Landscape composition and life‐history traits influence bat movement and space use: Analysis of 30 years of published telemetry data

description: Using temperate bats, a group of particular conservation concern, we
 investigated how morphological traits, habitat specialization and
 environmental variables affect home range sizes and daily foraging
 movements, using a compilation of 30 years of published bat telemetry data
 in Northern America and Europe for the period 1988 – 2016. We compiled
 data on home range size and mean daily distance between roosts and
 foraging areas at both colony and individual levels from 166 studies of
 3,129 radiotracked individuals of 49 bat species. We calculated
 multi-scale habitat composition and configuration in the surrounding
 landscapes of all studied roosts. Using mixed models, we examined the
 effects of habitat availability and spatial arrangement on bat movements,
 while accounting for body mass, aspect ratio, wing loading and habitat
 specialization. We found a significant effect of landscape composition on
 home range size and mean daily distance at both colony and individual
 levels. On average, home ranges were up to 42% smaller in the most
 habitat-diversified landscapes while mean daily distances were up to 30%
 shorter in the most forested landscapes. Bat home range size significantly
 increased with body mass, wing aspect ratio and wing loading, and
 decreased with habitat specialization.
description: We compiled telemetry data from 166 published studies between
 1988 and 2019 (see
 Appendix 1 for a full list of the data sources) for 49
 temperate bat species across 3,129 individuals, 22 countries and two
 continents (119 in Europe and 47 in North America). Our data represent 78%
 of all European bat species (32 out of 41) and 46% of all North Americans
 (17 out of 37 species). Studies were identified from the literature using
 a rigorous, transparent and repeatable protocol (Pullin & Stewart,
 2006). We extracted from each study, when available: (i) the Minimum
 Convex Polygon (MCP), as a metric of bat space use and the most frequently
 used method to estimate home range size (Harris <i>et al.</i>,
 1990); and (ii) daily distance traveled between roosts and foraging areas
 as a metric of bat movement. We then built four different response
 variables: home range size and daily foraging movement distance at colony
 level (i.e. mean from all the radio-tracked individuals at each roost) and
 at individual level. As studies did not systematically report data at both
 colony and individual levels, it was relevant to evaluate the consistency
 of our results through these two levels using different data subsets. Data
 at the colony level included the majority of studies (85%) and species
 (100%) because authors often documented mean values at that level, while
 data at the individual level were included in only 59% of the studies and
 82% of the species. Sample size (i.e., number of radio-tagged individuals)
 was reported for each data at colony level. For each home range and
 distance data, we reported the sex, age and reproductive status of the
 radio-tracked bats when available.
description: The readme file contains an explanation of each of the variables
 in the dataset, its measurement units