When i studied seed dispersal of Taxus chinensis, i found lots of seeds was dispersed in the night by mammal. Does anybody have suggestions for measuring seed dispersal in the night? Trap camera?
I am going to assume you are after a wild specimen being dispersed? Rather than one that could be planted. I was going to suggest that you could always insert the GFP gene for the seeds and then hopefully you'll easily find the dispersal patterns caused by the nocturnal mammals.
Assuming you mean the wild specimen, then you could use trap cameras, or even basic capture-mark-release techniques to trap the mammal itself so that you could easily identify the creatures responsible?
Camera traps are probably the easiest way to monitor the activity around the Chinese Yew at night, though you might come across the issue that you can't monitor all the activity, as camera traps are most useful for concentrating on one area (e.g. monitoring a nesting box for predation).
Are you certain that the seeds are being dispersed by a mammal? The fruit seems more targeted at avifauna (though of course it could be a small mammal such as a shrew).
What about fluorescent powders and a black light candle?
The following is a camera trap example which monitor seed predation on trees 24-hr. But sorry the pdf is only in Chinese. I cannot find its English version.
http://www.tfri.gov.tw/main/download.aspx?dlfn=%E5%B0%88%E8%A8%8A_82_%E5%A0%B1%E5%B0%8E1.pdf
Circular seed traps made of fine mesh that are open at dawn and closed at sunset, then collect the sample to review it to identify plant species by its seeds??
As some people mentioned, camera trap is the best option. We work on mammals dispersing seeds and many of them are nocturnal. We located the camera trap in a tree's branch focused on a cache of seeds. Even if seeds are large, you can identify mammal species and quantify seed removal for each one.
I'd start with mesh seed traps opened at dusk and closed at dawn (paired with traps for daytime seed rain). You can then use molecular methods and/or camera traps to identify the dispersal agent. But seed traps tend not to work with terrestrial mammals - which walk round them - so you may just have to sweep an area of ground clean at dusk and dawn. Video camera traps are most likely to get identifiable pictures of bats.
You do not mention in your question the size of the Taxus chinensis so this suggestion could be very far off base. If your specimen is shrub height or shorter it could be that larger animals than shrews or bats are taking the seed/fruit. I would research what types of animals are in the area of your specimen. Here in the southern US we have fox, raccoons, opossums, bears, deer, birds, squirrels, coyote and even lizards that will happily eat ripe fruit from shrubs and lower growing specimens. You may be able to deduce some information from where on your specimen the seeds/fruits are being removed. All over - could be something climbing or taller than your seed source; lower parts - something from the ground; upper parts - something flying in. Sweeping the area around your specimen should give you some indication of ground movement. An observation blind could also be used but you would need to spend some long nights monitoring in that case, try night vision equipment if you go that route.
Good luck!
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