Who prefers the dark? Daily activity of dung beetles from an Amazonian region

Abstract Temporal niche partitioning is an important mechanism for minimizing interspecific competition and promoting species coexistence in complex ecosystems. This allows sympatric competing species to exploit resources at different times of the day, minimizing direct competition and providing insights into the evolutionary processes of circadian distribution of communities, resource availability and intra‐ and interspecific competitive pressure. In this study, we examined diel activity patterns (nocturnal and diurnal periods) of dung beetle assemblages (species richness, abundance and assemblage structure) within a conserved region of Amazonian forest using pitfall traps baited with human faeces. Overall, we sampled a total of 430 individuals and 32 species. While dung beetle species richness and abundance did not differ significantly between day and night, a pronounced shift in species composition between diel activity patterns was observed, indicating clear temporal segregation of dung beetle species. Five species were classified as diurnal, four species were considered nocturnal and one species was an activity period generalist. Our findings highlight the importance of temporal dynamics as drivers of dung beetle species distributions in tropical forests, directly influencing resource partitioning and promoting behavioural adaptations that facilitate species coexistence in the Amazon rainforest.