Multimammate rat (Mastomys erythroleucus) capture-mark-recapture data in Bandia (Senegal) between 1984 and 2012

Abstract

Long-term ecological data are of paramount importance to document the effects of global changes on biodiversity and dynamics of populations and communities. The site of Bandia, 70 km southeast of Dakar in western Senegal, has been the scene of numerous ecological studies since the 1970s. In the frame of projects led by researchers of the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), rodent populations were monitored at various periods using capture-mark-recapture (CMR) protocols on trapping grids that yielded important datasets on population dynamics and ecology of the main species present. Among them, the Guinea Multimammate Rat Mastomys erythroleucus proved to represent the dominant species. Thus, CMR data were collected on M. erythroleucus between (i) November 1975–March 1981, (ii) January 1983–October 1986, (iii) January 1997–April 2001, and (iv) June 2007–June 2012. Raw data from the 1975–1981 period were not available, but those from the three other periods are now in the IRD data repository DataSuds at https://doi.org/10.23708/YEA5AR. They represent 2556 (re)captures of 1296 M. erythroleucus individuals. They include the identity of each animal captured with some biological attributes (sex, weight at first capture, and reproductive activity), exact date and point of capture (via a trap-specific code) at each trapping occasion, and additional comments that may help to interpret the data. This dataset concerning one of the most widespread rodent species of the Sahelo-Sudanian bioclimatic belt provides information that can be used to address various questions such as outbreak prediction or effects of climate change. The complete data set for this abstract published in the Data Article section of the journal is also available in electronic format in MetaCat in JaLTER at http://db.cger.nies.go.jp/JaLTER/metacat/metacat/ERDP-2024-05.1/jalter-en.