Animal Behaviour

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A characteristic that confers higher inclusive fitness to individuals than any other existing alternative exhibited by any other individuals within the population; a trait that has spread or will spread through the population as a result of natural selection or indirect selection

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Adaptation

Front 2

Helpful behalviour that raises the recipient's direct fitness while lowering the donor's direct fitness

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Altruism

Front 3

The study of the adaptive value of behavioural attributes of individuals in solving environmental obsticals to reproduction.

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Behavioural Ecology

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A form of learningin which an automatic, or unconditioned, responce (such as salivation upon detection of food stimuli) comes to be performed in reaction to a stimulus other that the one that normally elicits the behaviour (such as the sound of a bell or the shining of a light).

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Classical Conditioning

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The way a group of people or animals within a society or culture tend to learn and pass on new information

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Cultural transmission

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Predictable and complete behaviour; Instinctive

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Stereotypical behaviour

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The theory that an individual is developed by successive differentiation of an unstructured egg rather than by a simple enlarging of a preformed entity

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Epigenesis

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The fitness of an individual organism as measured in terms of the survival and reproductive success of its kin, each relative being valued according to the probability of shared genetic information, an offspring or sibling having a value of 50 percent and a cousin 25 percent.

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Inclusive Fitness

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Imprinting in which a young animal learns the characteristics of its parent.

e.g. Lorenz' greylag geese

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Filial imprinting

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an early learning process by which a young animal acquires information which will help in choosing a sexual partner

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Sexual imprinting

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The genetic contribution of an individual to the next generation's gene pool relative to the average for the population, usually measured by the number of offspring or close kin that survive to reproductive age.

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Fitness

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Example of inducing mutations to investigate the genetic basis of behaviour

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Drosophila (fruit fly) 'dunce' mutation unable to learn to avoid electric shock. Affects memory.

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Example of using artificial selection to investigate the genetic basis of behaviour

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Mice nest building - cotton

Mice wheel running/day

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Model organisms for genetic experiments

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Drosophila (fruit fly)

C. elegans (Nematode worm)

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The ultimate explanation for migration

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Animals who migrate do so because they leave more offspring

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Migration costs:
Energy expenditure

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Flying takes 6-8 x more energy than resting.

Migratory animals put on fat reserves prior to migrating

Snow buntings change direction if fat reserves are low

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Migration costs:
Predation

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Eleanora's falcon times breeding so young will hatch when migrating songbirds arrive.

Big cats track movement of migrating African ungulates

Wolves follow migrating caribou

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Migration costs:
Inhospitable terrain

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Terrestrial birds crossing the sea

Problems finding food or water

Obstacles:Lighthouses, sky scrapers, TV towers.

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Migration costs:
Weather

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Storms kill millions of migrating monarch butterflies.

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Migration benefits:
Weather

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Monarch butterflies: Canada -> Mexico

Food supply: Insectiverous Bats, Wildebeast follow rains (grass)

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Migration: Why return?

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North:Longer days

Mating sites: Pinnipeds, cetaceans

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Migration benefits:
Predation reduction

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Migratory ungulates,

North: short breeding season = simultaneous nesting (herd protection)

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Migration: cues

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Low food

Temperature

Daylength

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Simple orientation: Kinesis

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Rate of movement varies with strength of stimulus

e.g. Woodlice are more active in dry areas to find humidity

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Simple orientation: Taxis

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Movement towards or away from a stimulus based on direction.

Light: phototaxis
Gravity: Geotaxis
Chemical: Chemotaxis
Sound: Phonotaxis

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Orientation:
Piloting

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Using familiar landmarks to find a goal

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e.g. Salmon olfactory cues

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Compasses used for orientation

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Sun, stars, magnetism,

plane of polarisation

Sound

Scent

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Evidence for compass orientation

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Move animal to a distant location and determine whether it compensates.

Hint 28

e.g. Starlings were displaced experimentally. They flew in same direction and for same distance.

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Evidence for genetic control of migratory direction in birds

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Captive birds flutter in same direction as free birds, at same time of year.

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Compass orientation:
Dead reckoning

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Estimating direction of goal by using a 'sense of direction' i.e. compensating for previous twists and turns

Hint 30

e.g. A desert ant displaced away from it's nest will follow path which would had taken it home

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True navigation

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Ability to compensate for displacement using a mental 'map' and compass

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e.g. Homing pigeon

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Evidence for time compensated sun compass in birds

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Birds can find food in a ring of boxes, but orientation lost when sun is blocked

Hint 32

e.g. Kramers starlings

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Migratory restlessness

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Innate period of unrest during migrating season

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4 stages of a predator acquiring a food source

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Detection

Attack

Capture

Consumption

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Term for an animal being active during the day

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Diurnal

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Term for an animal being active at night

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Nocturnal

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Term for an animal being active during twilight

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Crepuscular

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Term for the ability of an animal to avoid detection by a predator

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Crypsis

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Crypsis:
3 example of camouflage in animals

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Cephalopods use chromatophores to match their background

Leafy sea dragons look like seaweed

Counter-shading in fish, artiodactyls, birds etc

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Term for a warning signal that prey is unpalatable/poisonous

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Aposematism

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3 examples of aposematism

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Insect: Bees and wasps

Mammal:Skunk

Amphibian: Poison dart frog

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Term for when two or more harmful species, that are not closely related and share one or more common predators, have come to mimic each other's warning signals.

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Müllerian mimicry

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An example of Müllerian mimicry

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The unpalatable lycid beetle (Coleoptera),and an unpalatable arctiid moth (Lepidoptera)

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Term for where a harmless species has evolved to imitate the warning signals of a harmful species directed at a common predator.

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Batesian mimicry

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An example of Batesian mimicry

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harmless KING snakes mimic the deadly CORAL snake

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Term for when a gazelle jumps high in the air to advertise its fitness to predators; making attack less likely.

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Stotting: A pronouncement of vigilance

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Term for when prey occur at high population densities, reducing the probability of an individual organism being eaten

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Predator satiation

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Benefits of predator satiation

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Dilution and confusion effect (schooling fish)

Mobbing

Alarm calls

(safety in numbers)

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Strategies to avoid consumption

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Expendable body parts (Autotomy)

Chemical sprays (bombardier beetle)

Attract the predator of your predator

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The term for the act whereby an animal severs one or more of its own appendages, usually as a self-defense mechanism designed to elude a predator's grasp.

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Autotomy

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A vertebrate which filter feeds

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Baleen whale

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An example of animals cultivating food

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Leaf-cutter ants create gardens of fungus

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sensory adaptation which enhances hunting ability in sharks and platipuses

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Electroreception

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Example of an optimal prey preference

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Northwestern crows drop large whelks.

They break easier

They have more calories

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Why don’t predators become so
efficient they drive prey to extinction?

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Life-dinner principle
– Prey is running for its life
– Predator is running for its dinner
– Selection pressure stronger on prey

Prey improve more quickly - shorter generation times

Rare prey cause predators to seek other prey species

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Why don’t prey evolve adaptations
that cause extinction of predator?

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As predator numbers decrease, so does
selection pressure on prey
– Prey stop evolving counter-
adaptations
– Predators become more numerous
– Selection pressure on prey
increases
– Prey evolve more counter-
adaptations

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Hamilton's rule

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rB-C>0

r = coefficient of relatedness
B = benefit to recipient
C = cost to donor

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Term for organisms which reproduce once in their lifetime

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Semelparity

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Term for organisms which have many reproductive cycles

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iteroparity

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An example of maternal care

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Humpback whales

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An example of paternal care

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sea horses

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An example of biparental care

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Laysan albatross

(Many are female/female)

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3 theories why females usually provide more parental care

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Certainty of paternity

Order of gamete released

Association with young

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Circumstances in which offspring recognition evolves

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Colonial

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Term for Individuals having a single mate during breeding season (or longer)

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Monogamy

e.g. Laysan Albatross

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Term for Individuals of one sex mating with > 1 individuals of other sex

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Polygamy

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Term for when males mate with > 1 female

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Polygyny

e.g. Northern elephant seals

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Term for when females mate with > 1 male

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Polyandry

e.g. Spotted sandpiper

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Term for when both sexes mate with > 1 individual

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Promiscuity

e.g. Bottlenose dolphin

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3 main kinds of polygyny

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Female-defence

Resource defence

Lek

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3 explanations why females accept polygyny

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Polygyny threshhold hypothesis

Sexy son hypothesis

Best alternative hypothesis

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Type of selection where weapons evolve through contests over mates

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INTRAsexual selection

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Type of selection where ornaments arise through choice of mate

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INTERsexual selection

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A form of reproduction in which dissimilar gametes, often differing in size, unite

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Anisogamy

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Term for the ratio of sexually competing males to females that are ready to mate

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Operational sex ratio

(OSR)

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Intersexual selection:

Examples of material benefits (resources) when choosing a mate

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Food - Nuptial gifts

Territory

Parental ability

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Intersexual selection:

Examples of species with traits that indicate good genes

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Red deer antler size

Elephant musth

Swallow tail length

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Hamilton-Zuk parasite hypothesis

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Traits indicate degree of parasite resistance

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Handicap principle

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An honest advertisement that the organism can survive despite being handicapped by an overlarge protrusion e.g. a long tail

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Infanticide:

Why young are targeted for killing between species

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Predation:
Smaller, less mobile, less defensible

Brood parasitism:

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Circumstances under which infanticide occurs within a colony/family

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Queen/Worker infanticide:

Brood = food store; When food short; Eat brood

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Circumstances under which infanticide occurs by males

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Grey langurs, Lions
Kill infants to bring females back in to estrus

Chimpanzees:
Intergroup - reduce competition

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Female adaptations to combat infanticide by males

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Promiscuity - paternity uncertain

Female creche

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Circumstances under which filial cannibalism occurs

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Scorpions:
Mother eats deformed offspring unable to climb onto her back

Rodents:
Mother eats youngest/weakest offspring when resources insufficient for litter

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Circumstances under which maternal infanticide occurs

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Resource shortage = Selective starvation

Filial cannibalism

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Term for when the presence of a new male induces female abortion

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The Bruce effect

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Mate competition:

Scramble competition

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• First male to arrive at female mates with her
• Males compete to outrace others to receptive female

• Selection favours
– Early search and swift location of mates
– Well-developed sensory and locomotory organs
– Earlier male than female emergence in insects

Noctuidae moths
• Male moths in the Noctuidae family can detect 1 ppb of female pheromone
• In some species females can’t fly
– Wait for male to find them

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Mate competition:

Endurance rivalry

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• Male RS correlated with amount of time at breeding site
– E.g. elephant seal; fallow deer
• Selection favours:
– Increased endurance (e.g. ability to store energy)
– Optimised energy use (e.g. efficient foraging)

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Mate competition:

Contest competition

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• Rivals display/fight in competition over mates or resources to attract mates
• Competitors usually sex with less PI
• Selection favours
– Traits improving fighting success (e.g. large size, strength; weapons)
– Traits improving display (e.g. elaborate and/or loud vocalisations)
– Alternative mating tactics

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3 explanations for polyandry

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Fertility insurance

Acquire better genes for offspring

Direct material benefits

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The two main factors which promote group living

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Predation

Food acquisition

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Costs of group living

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Parasites/disease

Competition for food, mates, nesting sites

More conspicuous to predators

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Benefits of group living

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Vigilance

Dilution effect

Defence: Mobbing, marguerite formation

Group hunting of large prey