Alimentação de tracajá (Podocnemis Unifilis), Iaçá (Podocnemis Sextuberculata) e tartaruga-da-amazônia (Podocnemis Expansa) no rio Juruá, Amazonas

Abstract

Studies of the diet of turtles contribute to the development of management strategies and existing information in the Amazon are still few. This study aimed to identify the composition of the diet of Podocnemis unifilis, P. sextuberculata and P. expansa in Juruá, Amazonas. Samples were collected in the vicinity of protected areas by the Program Pé-de-Pincha in the municipalities of Carauari and Juruá on Amazonas. Captures were conducted in the rainy season (May-June) and dry (August-September) in 2010, using gill nets in flooded vegetation and trawl the beaches on the shore. Of turtles, the stomach contents were collected by stomach pumped. In these analyzes we used the methods of frequency of occurrence (number of times that a particular item i occurs in the stomachs with food) and relative volume (percentage that each item i has in the stomachs with food). The results of both methods were combined food index (IAi), adjusted for percentage, which provides the most important food items in the diet. The results were compared from the Shannon index by t test, discriminant analysis of Manly and Bray-Curtis similarity. To P unifilis, the most important food items during the fruits were full (41.54%), leaves (21.93%), stems, trunks and stems (16.77%) and roots (5.93%), and Leaves were dried (21.93%), stem (13.36%) and algae (14.41%), being a herbivorous species. For P. sextuberculata, the most important food items during the flood were seeds (54.74%), leaves (13.65%), unidentified plant material (8.70%), fruits (8.37%) and roots (4, 47%) and dry undergoes a period of food restriction, and lesser amounts of leaves (18.61%), being a herbivorous species. For P. expansa, the most important food items during the fruits were full (44.61%), followed sheet (17.35%), seeds (15.49%), stems, stalks and bucks (12.10%), and the stalks were dry (39.05%) and leaves (19.04%), being a herbivorous species. There were no differences in diet between males and females for the three species and there were differences between flood and drought for P. unifilis and P. sextuberculata. The three species are generalists.