Behavioral Asymmetries among Mother-Infant Dyads of Syntopic Macaques (Macaca assamensis and M. mulatta) in Shivapuri-Nagarjun National Park, Nepal

The diurnal activity pattern of primates is affected by ecological and social factors including diet selection, distribution, abundance of food sources, social ranks, etc. Daily activity budgets of mothers and infants of the syntopic Assam macaque (Macaca assamensis) and rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) troops were observed in Shivapuri-Nagarjun National Park from September 2017 to January 2018 using focal animal sampling method. Even though both the species were semiprovisioned, activity budgets of rhesus macaques were found more influenced by human activities than the Assam macaques. Rhesus macaque mothers spent significantly more time in feeding and moving than Assam macaque mothers. Conversely, Assam macaque mothers spent significantly more time resting and grooming than that of rhesus macaque. Similarly, Assam macaque infants spent significantly more time in resting whereas rhesus macaque infants spent significantly more time in playing and being groomed. Rank-related differences in activity budgets were found in Assam macaque females whereas those were not significant in rhesus macaques. Sex of the infants did not have significant effect on their activity budgets, except for moving and playing in Assam and rhesus macaque infants, respectively. Feeding, moving, resting and playing behaviors in Assam macaque infants varied with their age whereas such variations were observed in moving and playing behaviors of rhesus macaque infants. However, ranks of the mothers in the troop were not found to be effective factor in determining activity budgets of both Assam and rhesus macaque infants.