Behavior and Ethology Commons^™

Limitations On Spatial Memory In Mice, Robert H.I. Dale, Martin Bedard

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Rats have an impressive ability to remember locations they have visited. Two experiments used an eight-arm radial maze to determine whether mice showed two important characteristics of this spatial memory: its durability, and its dependence on stimuli outside the maze (extreme stimuli). In Experiment 1, food-deprived mice were allowed to eat from four of the eight arms of the maze then, after delays of 5 sec, 1 min, or 5 min, they were permitted to choose the remaining arms. Choice accuracy declined significantly with the longer delays, but always remained above chance. In Experiment 2, the maze was rotated 180° …

Social Transmission Of Behavioural Traditions In A Coral Reef Fish, Gene Helfman, Eric T. Schultz

EEB Articles

Traditional behaviours involve the non-genetic transmission of social information across age classes or generations. French grunts (Haemulon flavolineatum) exhibit social traditions of daytime schooling sites and twilight migration routes. Individuals transplanted to new schooling sites and allowed to follow residents at the new sites used the new migration routes and returned to the new sites in the absence of resident fish. Control fish with no opportunity to learn showed no such directionality or return. This is the first demonstration of apparent pre-cultural behaviour in free-living fish. Our observations suggest additional classes of behaviour and taxonomic groups in which …

Research Objectives In Vertebrate Pest Control, A J. Oliver

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

The European rabbit, introduced into Australia in 856 by an early settler for hunting, caused massive losses to agricultural production in Western Australia in 1940s and 1950s.

In those years most of the country's recources and efforts allocated to vertebrate pest problems were aimed at controlling this animal.

Research and control measures by Commonwealth and State agencies, including the introduction of myxomatosis, were largely responsible for reducing the rabbit problem to the comparatively minor one it is now.

Today, the Agricultural Protection Board is involved in the control of a much wider range of mammals and birds which cause losses …

The Secretive Silvereyes, I J. Rooke

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

Durinf the past five years the agricultural Protection Board, in co-operation with scientists from CSIRO's Division of Wildlife Research and the University of Western Australia, had studied the biology and control of the silvereye in the South-West of Western Asustralia. The project was partially funded by a voluntary levy on vignerons in the Margaret River and Mt Barker areas.

The first part of the study investigated the bird's bioloogy - its food requirements, reproductive rate, how it interacted with other birds and its seasonal movements, It was hoped that this knowledge would help develop effective techniques for either controlling the …

Preventing Vineyard Damage By Silvereyes, I J. Rooke

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

In the previous article, Dr I Rooke outlined the studies which helped to devise practical ways of controlling attacks by silvereyes on vineyards in the South-West of Western Australia. The preventative methods vignerons can use are discussed here.

A Closer Look At Parrots As Pests, John L. Long

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

Small parrots have been attacking fruit and grain crops in the south of Western Australia at least since agriculture expanded into their native habitats in the early 1900s. The parrots are capable of quickly adapting to new situations so it is not surprising that they have eaten crops.

It is not known whether parrot numbers have increased since European settlement began, but this appears likely. The present landscape of islands of uncleared country interspersed with areas of agriculture appears to favour the survival of the red-capped parrot, western rosella and the Port Lincoln parrot. These species were investigated during a …

Keeping Starlings Out Of W.A, John L. Long

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

In Europe and North America huge flocks of starlings cause millions of dollars worth of damage to grain and fruit crops each year and large sums of money are spent trying to control them.

Starlings were introduced into australia in the late 1890s when more than 200 birds were released near Melbourne. They are now well established over much of eastern Australia, ranging from central Queensland, south to Tasmania and along the Great Australian Bight to the South Australian-Western Australian border, occasionally crossing it and sometimes moving as far west as the Esperance region on the south coast.

Some people …

Dummy-Elicited Aggressive Behavior In The Polychromatic Midas Cichlid, George W. Barlow, William Rogers, Alan B. Bond

Alan Bond Publications

Aggressive responses of 12 individuals of the polychromatic Midas cichlid Cichlasoma citrinellum were tested with five different sizes of neutrally colored (spot pattern) life-like dummies. The dummies were presented daily over six days, for one minute apiece, in a balanced design. Color (gold or normal morph) and sex of the subjects were varied independently. The attacks and threats at the dummies were positively correlated in their occurrence so they were combined to yield an aggregate measure of aggression. Attacks on blinded juveniles, five minutes before and five minutes after viewing a dummy, were analyzed to test for the occurrence of …

Avoidance Learning And Memory In Largemouth Bass (Micropterus Salmoides) Fed Bufo Tadpoles, Randy John Gawlik

Masters Theses

Tadpoles of the American toad (Bufo americanus) have been shown to be distasteful to largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) predators who learn, on the short term, to avoid them. How long bass retain this learned avoidance of Bufo larvae is unknown so an experimental design was constructed in an attempt to answer this question.

Largemouth bass were divided into four treatment groups. Two groups were initially fed exclusively larvae of Bufo americanus (one group was fed large tadpoles, the other group fed small larvae). Similarily, the other two groups were initially fed spring peeper (Hyla crucifer …

Seasonal Lekking Behavior Of The Greater Prairie-Chicken In Illinois, Scott A. Simpson

Masters Theses

Spring behavior of prairie-chickens (Tympanuchus cupido) has been studied extensively, however there is little information on fall-winter lekking activity. Greater prairie-chickens were observed weekly on a lek from 25 September 1982 to 23 June 1983 during morning and evening hours in Jasper County, Illinois. The peak number of prairie-chicken males on the lek occurred in February although hen attendance did not occur until 10 March 1983. All spring lekking activities were higher compared to that of the fall-winter period. Fall-winter lek activity was aggression which centered on probably brief, less intense male aggression which probably establishes or maintains …

Dingoes And Sheep In Pastoral Areas, P C. Thomson

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

Since 1975, a long-term study of dingoes in the Fortescue River area of northern Western Australia has sought to provide the detailed information necessary to devise efficient dingo management strategies.

Dingoes have been fitted with radio-transmitter collars, then tracked and observed from a specially equipped aircraft. Their movements, breeding, hunting and social behaviour have been monitered in the rugged, spinifex-covered ironstone terrain which represents typicaldingo refuge country, and in neighbouring sheep country.

Although the pastoral and agricultural industry have long recognised the need to control dingoes to protect livestock, particularily sheep, there is little published evidence about the type of …

Operant Conditioning In The Water Snake (Nerodia Sipedon), Angela R. Deitz

Masters Theses

Six subjects of Nerodia sipedon were tested for runway acquisition. Five of six subjects met criterion for runway learning, demonstrating a significant decrease over the 25 day testing period in mean latency and running times. Four subjects completed 170 trials in a T-maze to test two-choice discrimination and reversal learning. All subjects met criterion for the initial discrimination and one reversal while two subjects completed four reversals and one subject met criterion for six reversals. Results are similar or superior to those previously reported for reptiles and other non-human vertebrates.

Operant Conditioning In The Psittacine, Amazona Amazonica, Gloria J. Nadolski

Masters Theses

Two Orange-winged Amazon Parrots, (Amazona amazonica) were subjected to operant conditioning involving three tests: two-choice spatial discrimination and reversal, three-choice color discrimination and reversal, and the oddity principle. Results of the habit reversal tests were compared to those of Gossett (1968) to determine the phylogenetic ranking of the learning capabilities of psittacines. In the first two habit reversal tests, the subjects completed twenty reversals using sunflower seeds as positive reinforcements. In the oddity principle test, the parrots completed the equivalent of 20 reversals, again using sunflower seeds. Criterion was met when they completed 8 consecutive correct choices with …

Aspects Of The Nesting Ecology Of Least Terns And Piping Plovers In Central Nebraska, Craig A. Faanes

Papers in Ornithology

Breeding habitat of the least tern is made up primarily of coastal beaches and inland river sandbars. Populations of the interior (Sterna antillarum athalassos) and east coast (S. a. antillarum) subspecies are now declining (Marshall et al. 1975, Duffy 1977, Jernigan et al. 1978) and the western subspecies (S. a. browni) is endangered (Wilbur 1974). Although coastal populations have received considerable attention (Wolk 1974, Atwood et al. 1977, Blodgett 1978), little research has been conducted on the interior race (Hardy 1957, Downing 1975).

The piping plover inhabits river sandbars and sand beaches and, like …

The Effect Of Crowding On Growth Of The Cichlid Fish, Oreochromis Mossambicus, Bonnie A. Barrows

OES Theses and Dissertations

It has been reported that the Java tilapia, Oreochromis mossambicus, displays hypersensitivity to a substance it produces when biomass levels in a flow-through culture system exceed 20 g/1, resulting in reduced growth and high mortality. Experiments on the growth of this species in small tanks were conducted in order to determine whether O. mossambicus produces a growth-inhibiting compound under crowded conditions. This species was successfully maintained at biomass levels of 38 g/1 and 57 g/1 with a total mortality of only 4.5%.

The Java tilapia can grow rapidly in small aquaria, as indicated by the data taken during Experiment …

Homing And Ecology In The Southern Flying Squirrel, Glaucomys Volans In Southeastern Virginia, Sherrie Lynn Sawyer

Biological Sciences Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine whether homing occurred in the southern flying squirrel, Glauaomys volans, and if so, the greatest homing distance. Information on the squirrel's ecology, reproductive biology and use of artificial nest boxes was also obtained. The study was conducted from November 1978 through March 1981, using nest boxes placed in a deciduous forest in southeastern Virginia.

For the homing experiments, twenty squirrels were released a total of 29 times along three lines at distances of 250 m to 1.6 km from the homesites. Squirrels were found to home successfully up to 1,000 m.

The …

The Effects Of Ethostasis On Farm Animal Behavior: A Theoretical Overview, A. F. Fraser, M. W. Fox

Ethology Collection

The solution of animal problems that occur on the farm requires a holistic and multidisciplinary orientation and analysis, as well as the acquisition of new investigatory tools by both veterinarians and animal scientists. Field studies may be modeled under more controlled laboratory conditions, but the most relevant investigations must take place on the farm, and the first level of analysis should be ethological. Domestic animal behavior can be monitored and quantified like any other factor in the animals' environment; yet it has been virtually ignored in the development of new livestock husbandry systems.

The relationships between husbandry systems, disease problems, …

Environmental Psychology And Great Ape Reproduction, Terry L. Maple

Zoos and Aquariums Collection

At the 1980 Great Ape Infertility Workshop, we concluded that "physical and social environments must be improved if not optimized if great apes are to reproduce satisfactorily ... " In 1982, the trend toward improvement continues and there are some promising signs that reproduction has been enhanced as predicted. The problem of designing and evaluating captive environments which will facilitate interaction, reproduction, appropriate parenting, and socialization is well within the scope of Environmental Psychology. I intend to illustrate the promise of this applied research field in the remarks that follow.

Effects Of Moose, Alces Alces, On Aquatic Vegetation In Sibley Provincial Park, Ontario, D. Fraser, H. Hristienko

Feeding Behavior Collection

The effect of Moose (AIces aIces) on aquatic vegetation was studied in Sibley Provincial Park, Ontario. Two small exclosures were built in preferred feeding lakes to protect vegetation from Moose. Both exclosures developed a dense growth of plants. In one, species palatable to Moose were much more abundant than in unprotected areas. The other lake supported very little vegetation outside the exclosure. Aquatic vegetation in a large preferred lake underwent a series of changes from the 1960's to 1980. Nuphar variegatum and Potamogeton filiformis largely disappeared, leaving the lake sparsely vegetated in some years and dominated by annuals in others. …

Dynamic Effects Of Food Magnitude On Interim-Terminal Interaction, Alliston K. Reid, Robert H.I. Dale

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

We tested the assumption of a facilitatory relation between periodic food presentation and schedule-induced drinking by examination of (a) elicited drinking, (b) drinking in anticipation of food delivery, and (c) possible indirect effects of food delivery on drinking. We exposed rats to a fixed-time 60-second schedule in which interfood intervals ended in either one or four food pellets with equal probability. In Phases 1 and 3, a stimulus signaled the magnitude of upcoming food presentation. In Phase 2, the stimulus was eliminated. Changes in drinking and "head-in-feeder" distributions within interfood intervals demonstrated that head-in-feeder was controlled directly by food presentation, …

The Foraging Behavior Of Lacewing Larvae On Vertical Rods, Alan B. Bond

Alan Bond Publications

The foraging behavior of lacewing larvae (Chrysopa carnea Stephens, Chrysopidae, Neuroptera) on vertical lucite rods was observed under a variety of experimental conditions to investigate the decision processes responsible for the distribution of foraging effort. Food deprivation increased the duration of searching on all parts of the rod, whereas contact with prey at the rod tip induced only a local enhancement of searching activity. Searching at the rod tip did not decline with repeated trials on the same rod, but the duration of searching on the rest of the rod was reduced, evidently reflecting recognition and avoidance of previously-searched …

Scaring Of Carrion Crows (Corvus Corone Corone) By Species-Specific Distress Calls And Suspended Bodies Of Dead Crows, Luzia Naef-Daenzer

Bird Control Seminars Proceedings

In Switzerland, carrion crows can cause considerable damage to sprouting corn fields when feeding on the germinated corn. I tried to evaluate a method to prevent these damages. The use of species-specific distress calls, for the first time described by Frings and Jumber (1954), seemed to be the most promising method. Agronomes and biologists have applied it in field studies to several different bird species causing damage in agriculture and on airports (e.g., Gramet, 1962; Brough, 1968). However, the literature either describes single actions or several different scaring devices being used together. To be able to judge the method, quantitative …

Optimal Foraging Theory And The Psychology Of Learning, Alan Kamil

Avian Cognition Papers

The development of optimization theory has made important contributions to the study of animal behavior. But the optimization approach needs to be integrated with other methods of ethology and psychology. For example, the ability to learn is an important component of efficient foraging behavior in many species, and the psychology of animal learning could contribute substantially to testing and extending the predictions of optimal foraging theory.

The Transmission Of Learned Behavior: An Observational Study Of Father-Child Interactions During Fishing, Judy Diamond, Alan B. Bond

Papers in Behavior in Biological Sciences

Mechanisms of transmission of learned behavior were described in terms of the behavioral interactions between fathers and their children as they fished from a pier on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Verbal and nonverbal behaviors were analyzed using hierarchical cluster analysis and the patterns of association in the behavioral repertoire were described in detail. Groupings of associated behaviors ranged from clusters suggestive of modeling or simple showing to complex combinations of behaviors involved in teaching. There were indications that the transmission behaviors varied with the content of the transmitted information and the role of the performer. Role differentiation in the transmission behaviors …

Visual Search And Selection Of Natural Stimuli In The Pigeon: The Attention Threshold Hypothesis, Alan B. Bond

Papers in Behavior in Biological Sciences

During visual search for samples of varying proportions of familiar, natural food grains displayed against a complex gravel background, pigeons exhibited “matching selection,” a tendency to overselect the more common grain. The matching selection effect was decreased at low levels of stimulus/background contrast and reversed when the grains were highly conspicuous. The results were consistent with the hypothesis that stimulus detectability should be enhanced by recent experience with a particular grain type, but they showed no convincing indications of a corresponding effect on the response criterion. An explanatory model, termed the attention threshold hypothesis, argues that the mean latency of …

Aquatic Feeding By Moose: Seasonal Variation In Relation To Plant Chemical Composition And Use Of Mineral Licks, D. Fraser, B. K. Thompson, D. Arthur

Feeding Behavior Collection

Activity of moose (Alces alces) was studied at aquatic feeding areas and at natural, sodium-rich licks during four periods covering late May to early September. Aquatic feeding increased from period 1 (late May and early June) to period 2 (late June and early July) and had declined by late July. Major activity at mineral licks occurred earlier in the season than aquatic feeding, especially for males. Chemical composition of aquatic plants showed no seasonal changes corresponding to the peak of aquatic feeding in period 2, although the sodium content of some species declined in period 3. We suggest that moose …

The Ecology Of The Mottled Sculpin, Cottus Bairdii, In The Clearwater River, Beltrami County, Minnesota, Mark A. Hanson

Biology Graduate Theses

No abstract provided.

An Analysis Of Howling Response Parameters Useful For Wolf Pack Censusing, Fred H. Harrington, L. David Mech

United States Geological Survey, Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center: Publications

Gray wolves (Canis lupus) were studied from April 1972 through April 1974 in National Forest in northeastern Minnesota by radio-tracking and simulated howling. Based during 217 of 456 howling sessions, the following recommendations were derived for using howling as a census technique: (1) the best times of day are dusk and night; (2) July, August, and are the best months; (3) precipitation and winds greater than 12 km/hour should be avoided; (of 5 single howls should be used, alternating "flat" and "breaking" howls; (5) trials should 3 times at about 2-minute intervals with the first trial at lower …

Feeding Behavior Of Three Species Of Spionid Polychaetes, Thomas Lane Stokes Jr.

Biological Sciences Theses & Dissertations

Observations of feeding behavior of three species of spionid polychaetes (Paraprionospio pinnata, Polydora ligni, and Streblospio benedicti) were performed in currents ranging from 0 to 10 cm/sec over fine and coarse sediments and in high and low suspended particle loads. These interface feeders may suspension feed, deposit feed, or both simultaneously using a pair of anterior tentaculate feeding palps. P. ligni and S. benedicti were found to alter their palp behaviors in response to experimental manipulations. P. ligni reacted strongly to currents by suspension feeding with coiled palps. S. benedicti reacted strongly and complexly to food particle type and availability. …

Determining The Uptake And Possible Assimilation Of The Plant Component Of Spartina Detritus By Palaemonetes Pugio Using A Rapid Radiolabeling Method, Michael Peter Crosby

Biological Sciences Theses & Dissertations

Assimilation of the plant components of Spartina alterniflora detritus by the grass shrimp, Palaemonetes pugio, was investigated in a laboratory feeding study. A new radiolabeling procedure was utilized to label the sterilized detritus with ¹⁴C. Organic carbon values were calculated for both S. alterniflora and P. pugio. The grass shrimp were found to assimilate significantly the detritus, with an assimilation efficiency of approximately 14%, and an approximate ingestion rate of 2.508 x l0^-4mg C detritus/mg C shrimp hour^-l occurred. It is hypothesized that coprophagous activity may be important to the completion of digestion of …