A new study has used camera-trap footage and scent analysis to confirm the unusual relationship between an African melon and the aardvark, an elusive ant-eating mammal found in sub-Saharan Africa. Cucumbers and similar melon-like plants generally display their fruits aboveground, but an African melon (Cucumis humifructus) buries its fruit about 20 centimeters (8 inches) underground, a rare approach to seed dispersal. Previous evidence suggests aardvarks help disperse the melon’s seeds: Researchers have found the seeds in aardvark intestines and poop and observed the plant emerging from aardvark droppings. Indigenous people and local communities also speak of the duo’s close association; in Afrikaans, C. humifructus is known as erdvarkkomkommer, or “aardvark cucumber.” To verify the aardvark’s role, the new study deployed camera traps on a farm in Namibia at three kinds of sites: those where C. humifructus plants were fruiting at natural depths, those where the researchers placed the melon’s fruits at shallow depths, and those with the fruits kept aboveground. The cameras recorded 11 mammal species around the fruits, but aardvarks and porcupines were the most frequent visitors. The aardvarks were the only ones who dug deeply enough to remove the naturally buried fruits, while the porcupines ate only the shallow-buried fruits or those aboveground. Moreover, aardvark poop contained intact melon seeds, while porcupine droppings tended to have damaged ones. The authors posit that C. humifructus evolved to bury its fruits deep to avoid the seeds being destroyed by animals like porcupines. As to how aardvarks detect the deeply buried fruits,…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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