scholarly journals Evolving communicative complexity: insights from rodents and beyond

2012 ◽  
Vol 367 (1597) ◽  
pp. 1869-1878 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimberly A. Pollard ◽  
Daniel T. Blumstein
Keyword(s):  
Group Size ◽  
Social Role ◽  
Alarm Call ◽  
Ground Squirrels ◽  
Prairie Dogs ◽  
Behavioural Ecology ◽  
Simple Complex ◽  
Repertoire Size ◽  
Comprehensive Theory ◽  
Call Repertoire

Social living goes hand in hand with communication, but the details of this relationship are rarely simple. Complex communication may be described by attributes as diverse as a species' entire repertoire, signallers' individualistic signatures, or complex acoustic phenomena within single calls. Similarly, attributes of social complexity are diverse and may include group size, social role diversity, or networks of interactions and relationships. How these different attributes of social and communicative complexity co-evolve is an active question in behavioural ecology. Sciurid rodents (ground squirrels, prairie dogs and marmots) provide an excellent model system for studying these questions. Sciurid studies have found that demographic role complexity predicts alarm call repertoire size, while social group size predicts alarm call individuality. Along with other taxa, sciurids reveal an important insight: different attributes of sociality are linked to different attributes of communication. By breaking social and communicative complexity down to different attributes, focused studies can better untangle the underlying evolutionary relationships and move us closer to a comprehensive theory of how sociality and communication evolve.

The evolution of functionally referential alarm communication

1999 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 135-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel T. Blumstein
Keyword(s):  
Alarm Call ◽  
Referential Communication ◽  
Alarm Calls ◽  
Repertoire Size ◽  
Motor Abilities ◽  
Antipredator Responses ◽  
Tight Association ◽  
Functionally Referential ◽  
Alarm Communication ◽  
Call Repertoire

Many species produce specific alarm vocalizations when they encounter predators. There is considerable interest in the degree to which bird, ground-dwelling sciurid rodent, and primate alarm calls denote the species or type of predator that elicited the vocalization. When there is a tight association between the type or species of predator eliciting an alarm call, and when a played-back alarm call elicits antipredator responses qualitatively similar to those seen when individuals personally encounter a predator, the alarm calls are said to be functionally referential. In this essay I aim to make two simple points about the evolution of functionally referential alarm communication. Firstly, functionally referential communication is likely to be present only when a species produces acoustically distinct alarm vocalizations. Thus, to understand its evolution we must study factors that influence the evolution of alarm call repertoire size. Secondly, and potentially decoupled from the ability to produce acoustically distinctive alarm vocalizations, species must have the perceptual and motor abilities to respond differently to acoustically-distinct alarm vocalizations. Thus, to understand the evolution of functionally referential communication we also must study factors that influence the evolution of context-independent perception. While some factors may select for functionally referential alarm communication, constraints on production or perception may prevent its evolution.

Genetic and alarm call diversity across scattered populations of speckled ground squirrels (Spermophilus suslicus)

2016 ◽  
Vol 81 (3) ◽  
pp. 255-265 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vera A. Matrosova ◽  
Mikhail Yu. Rusin ◽  
Elena V. Volodina ◽  
Svetlana V. Proyavka ◽  
Ludmila E. Savinetskaya ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Alarm Call ◽  
Ground Squirrels ◽  
Spermophilus Suslicus

scholarly journals The song remains the same: Juvenile Richardson’s ground squirrels do not respond differentially to mother’s or colony member’s alarm calls

2012 ◽  
Vol 58 (5) ◽  
pp. 773-780 ◽  
Author(s):  
James F. Hare ◽  
Kurtis J. Warkentin
Keyword(s):  
Adult Female ◽  
Escape Behavior ◽  
Alarm Call ◽  
Ground Squirrels ◽  
Alarm Calls ◽  
Digital Audio ◽  
Predator Detection ◽  
Postural Responses ◽  
Limited Opportunity ◽  
Predator Model

Abstract Alarm calls are emitted by Richardson’s ground squirrels Urocitellus richardsonii in response to avian and terrestrial predators. Conspecifics detecting these calls respond with increased vigilance, promoting predator detection and evasion, but in doing so, lose time from foraging. That loss can be minimized if alarm call recipients discriminate among signalers, and weight their response accordingly. For juvenile ground squirrels, we predicted that the trade-off between foraging and vigilance could be optimized via selective response to alarm calls emitted by their own dam, and/or neighboring colony members over calls broadcast by less familiar conspecifics. Alarm calls of adult female Richardson’s ground squirrels were elicited in the field using a predator model and recorded on digital audio tape. Free-living focal juveniles were subjected to playbacks of a call of their mother, and on a separate occasion a call from either another adult female from their own colony, or an adult female from another colony. Neither immediate postural responses and escape behavior, nor the duration of vigilance manifested by juveniles differed with exposure to alarm calls of the three adult female signaler types. Thus, juveniles did not respond preferentially to alarm calls emitted by their mothers or colony members, likely reflecting the high cost of ignoring alarm signals where receivers have had limited opportunity to establish past signaler reliability.

scholarly journals Catch the wave: prairie dogs assess neighbours’ awareness using contagious displays

2014 ◽  
Vol 281 (1777) ◽  
pp. 20132153 ◽  
Author(s):  
James F. Hare ◽  
Kevin L. Campbell ◽  
Robert W. Senkiw
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Real Time ◽  
Group Size ◽  
Social Information ◽  
Group Living ◽  
Cynomys Ludovicianus ◽  
Prairie Dogs ◽  
Social Awareness ◽  
Prairie Dog ◽  
Active Probing

The jump–yip display of black-tailed prairie dogs ( Cynomys ludovicianus ) is contagious, spreading through a prairie dog town as ‘the wave’ through a stadium. Because contagious communication in primates serves to assess conspecific social awareness, we investigated whether instigators of jump–yip bouts adjusted their behaviour relative to the response of conspecifics recruited to display bouts. Increased responsiveness of neighbouring town members resulted in bout initiators devoting a significantly greater proportion of time to active foraging. Contagious jump–yips thus function to assess neighbours’ alertness, soliciting social information to assess effective conspecific group size in real time and reveal active probing of conspecific awareness consistent with theory of mind in these group-living rodents.

Geographic diversification in the call repertoire of the genus Pyrrhocorax (Aves, Corvidae)

2001 ◽  
Vol 79 (9) ◽  
pp. 1568-1576 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paola Laiolo ◽  
Antonio Rolando ◽  
Anne Delestrade ◽  
Augusto De Sanctis
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Geographic Distance ◽  
Geographic Diversification ◽  
Repertoire Size ◽  
Interspecific Differences ◽  
Call Repertoire

We analysed the call repertoires of the Red-billed Chough (Pyrrhocorax pyrrhocorax) and the Alpine Chough (Pyrrhocorax graculus) across three continents (Europe, Asia, and Africa) for intraspecific and interspecific differences in call-repertoire size and discuss the factors that could have promoted its evolution. The overall call repertoire of the Red-billed Chough was twice as large as that of the Alpine Chough, but the number of calls recorded in each population did not differ significantly between the two species. The greater fragmentation of the range of the Red-billed Chough possibly induced its remarkable call-repertoire diversification. Some populations (i.e., those from Ethiopia, Central Asia, Canaries) had a peculiar call repertoire that overlapped very little with those from other regions; consequently, the overall numbers of call types within the species were heavily influenced by these unusual populations and were very large. The call-repertoire size and call-repertoire similarity of populations of both species were affected and constrained by geographic distance. More closely situated or continental populations tended to have a more similar pool of calls (this is probably due to mingling among close populations).

Invasion of the Forest By an African Savannah Monkey: Behavioural Adaptations

Behaviour ◽  
1980 ◽  
Vol 73 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 238-260 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Kavanagh
Keyword(s):  
Group Size ◽  
Related Species ◽  
Cercopithecus Aethiops ◽  
Alarm Calls ◽  
Agricultural Pests ◽  
South West ◽  
Vigilance Behaviour ◽  
Call Repertoire ◽  
Behavioural Adaptations ◽  
Male Pattern

AbstractTantalus monkeys, a race of the savannah species Cercopithecus aethiops, have invaded the cultivated forest of Bakossi in south-west Cameroon during the last seventy years and become important agricultural pests. The cultivated forest is a new habitat to which they are well adapted by virtue of their eclectic diet, their habit of foraging away from tall trees, their semi-terrestriality, their flexible group size and their cryptic nature. The indigenous related species of the rainforest are less able to exploit the changed habitat, probably because they are insufficiently terrestrial or cryptic and they typically forage among the trees that provide their refuge. As a result of their conflict with the farmers whose crops they raid, the forest tantalus monkeys contrast with conspecifics in the savannah by their less predictable ranging patterns, their quieter call repertoire, a striking and consistent male pattern of vigilance behaviour and their habit of hiding from dogs rather than giving the loud alarm calls that are invariably given where canids are not associated with man.

scholarly journals Survey of peridomestic mammal susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angela M. Bosco-Lauth ◽  
J. Jeffrey Root ◽  
Stephanie M. Porter ◽  
Audrey E. Walker ◽  
Lauren Guilbert ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Base ◽  
Human Population ◽  
Ground Squirrels ◽  
Prairie Dogs ◽  
Deer Mice ◽  
House Mice ◽  
Wild Animals ◽  
Wildlife Species ◽  
Fox Squirrels ◽  
Striped Skunks

AbstractWild animals have been implicated as the origin of SARS-CoV-2, but it is largely unknown how the virus affects most wildlife species and if wildlife could ultimately serve as a reservoir for maintaining the virus outside the human population. Here we show that several common peridomestic species, including deer mice, bushy-tailed woodrats, and striped skunks, are susceptible to infection and can shed the virus in respiratory secretions. In contrast, we demonstrate that cottontail rabbits, fox squirrels, Wyoming ground squirrels, black-tailed prairie dogs, house mice, and racoons are not susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection. Our work expands upon the existing knowledge base of susceptible species and provides evidence that human-wildlife interactions could result in continued transmission of SARS-CoV-2.

Effect of Group Size on Survival of Relocated Prairie Dogs

1995 ◽  
Vol 59 (4) ◽  
pp. 867 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin W. Robinette ◽  
William F. Andelt ◽  
Kenneth P. Burnham
Keyword(s):  
Group Size ◽  
Prairie Dogs
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