Abstract:
Cercopithecus mona are widely distributed animals in Nigeria that require special attention from the behavioural studies and management perspectives. Little or no knowledge had been acquired on the activity budget of this animal in the country. Daily activity budget of Cercopithecus mona were studied in Ibodi Monkey Forest. The study aimed at determining the behaviour categories, daily activity budget and threats to the behavior of Mona monkey in the study area. Direct Observations were undertaken for twenty days from February, 2013 to May, 2013 using the behavioral scanning method. Daily scan was embarked for 10 days each in both rainy and dry seasons. T statistic was applied to analyze the behaviour dataset obtained and tested at P<0.05. Eight activities were observed namely; Locomotion, resting, feeding, playing, vocalization, grooming, agonistic and mating. It was revealed that during the rainy season, Mona monkey used most of their time for moving (32%), followed by feeding (25%), then resting (23%) while playing and grooming had 11% and 6% respectively. The least period was expended on three activities; vocalization, agonistic and mating which had 1% each. During the dry season, the highest period was expended on locomotion (37%), followed by feeding (32%), then resting (16%) while playing, vocalization, grooming and agonistic had 5%, 6%, 2% and 2% respectively, while none on mating. Moreover, t statistics of the daily activity budget between rainy and dry seasons revealed that locomotion (t= - 0.12, P= 0.90), feeding (t= - 0.95, P= 0.37), and agonistic (t= 0.77, P= 0.45) had no significant difference (P>0.05), while resting (t= 8.16, P= 0.00), playing (t= 18.22, P= 0.00), vocalization (t= -11.35, P= 0.00), grooming (t= 11.95, P= 0.00) and mating (t= 2.27, P= 0.04) had significant difference (P<0.05). Three threats to the behaviour of the studied animals were observed. These are urbanization, agricultural activities and logging/ flitching. Moreover, the aforementioned human activities had shrunk and damaged the habitat of Cercopithecus mona thus affecting their food sources. However, judicious use of this information can be an important tool to develop the ecotourism potentials and ensure effective conservation and management of this species in perpetuity at the site.
