Behavior and Ethology Commons^™

Parallel-Arm Maze Performance Of Sighted And Blind Rats: Spatial Memory And Maze Structure, Robert H.I. Dale

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Sighted and peripherally blinded groups of rats learned to obtain a small reward from each arm of an eight-arm parallel maze, and a sighted group was similarly trained on a radial maze. The parallel-sighted and parallel-blind groups were equally slow, and much slower than the radial-sighted group, to attain criterion performance. The three groups shared several response characteristics: selectively avoiding the most recently entered arms, frequently choosing adjacent arms, and an absence of 'spatial generalization' among the arms. The findings support a simple model proposing how subjects identify and choose among the maze-arms.

Predation By Wild Coyotes: Behavioral And Ecological Analyses, Michael C. Wells, Marc Bekoff

Ethology Collection

Predatory behavior of coyotes (Canis latrans) was studied between 1977 and 1980 in the Grand Teton National Park, Jackson, Wyoming. Major prey were voles (Microtus spp.), Uinta ground squirrels (Spermophilus armatus), pocket gophers (Thomomys talpoides), and grasshoppers (Locustidae). Coyotes typically rushed and ran down squirrels; when hunting mice, coyotes pounced and stabbed at them with their forepaws. Sequence structure was similar, though sequences directed to squirrels were significantly more variable. When juvenile coyotes hunted mice, sequences were similar to those performed by adults that hunted mice. Adults and juveniles were about equally successful. The size of prey last eaten influenced …

Behavioral Ecology Of Coyotes: Social Organization, Rearing Patterns, Space Use, And Resource Defense, Marc Bekoff, Michael C. Wells

Ethology Collection

Two groups of coyotes in which genealogical relationships were known were studied in the Grand Teton National Park, outside of Jackson, Wyoming, U.S.A., from 1977-1982. One group, a pack consisting of parents and some non-dispersing and non-breeding offspring, defended a territory and the food (mainly elk carrion) contained within it, especially during winter, and also had helpers at den sites (5 of 6 were males). The other group, a mated resident pair, all of whose young dispersed during the first year of life, did not defend a territory and never had helpers at dens. Delayed dispersal and retention of some …

Response Strategies In The Radial Arm Maze: Running Around In Circles, Sonja I. Yoerg, Alan C. Kamil

Papers in Behavior in Biological Sciences

The effects of the size of the central arena on the use of response strategies by rats on an eight~arm elevated maze were examined. The size of the central arena had no effect on accuracy, but the use of adjacent arms increased significantly with a larger central arena, regardless of the size of arena to which rats were first exposed. These results are interpreted in terms of foraging efficiency.

The Bead Game: Response Strategies In Free Assortment, Alan B. Bond

Alan Bond Publications

Subjects were presented with a collection of spherical beads of four different colors and were instructed to sort them as fast and as accurately as possible. The sequence in which the beads were sorted was recorded, along with the time intervals between successive beads. Subjects were observed to sort in nonrandom sequences, producing runs in which a given bead type was taken exclusively. The speed and accuracy of the sorting process was positively correlated with the degree of nonrandomness of the sorting sequence. This relationship appeared to be primarily attributable to perceptual factors involved in the initiation of a run …

Spatial Learning As An Adaptation In Hummingbirds, Susan Cole, F. Reed Hainsworth, Alan Kamil, Terre Mercier, Larry L. Wolf

Avian Cognition Papers

An ecological approach based on food distribution suggests that hummingbirds should more easily learn to visit a flower in a new location than to learn to return to a flower in a position just visited, for a food reward. Experimental results support this hypothesis as well as the general view that differences in learning within and among species represent adaptations.

Social, Spacing, And Cooperative Behavior Of The Collared Peccary, Tayassu Tajacu, John A. Byers, Marc Bekoff

Ethology Collection

Social behavior of the collared peccary was studied on the lower, eastern slopes of the Mazatzal Mountains, Arizona. The social unit in this species is a cohesive herd, in which small inter-individual distances are maintained. Two conspicuous acts, one olfactory and one auditory, functioned to maintain close spacing. Social interactions were brief but tended to synchronize the activities of animals and also to bring them closer together. Amicable and neutral actions occurred far more frequently than agonistic interactions. Most agonistic behavior did not involve physical contact. Cooperative nursing, predator defense, and feeding occurred; all adults were tolerant of young, and …

Activity Of Moose And White-Tailed Deer At Mineral Springs, D. Fraser, H. Hristienko

Social Behavior Collection

Activity of moose (Alces alces) and white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) was studied at two natural mineral springs (licks) in Ontario during the springtime and summer of 1977 to 1980. Most adult moose appeared to use a lick during a single 1- to 5-day period in a year; some returned at intervals during the season; and all seemed drawn principally by the mineral-rich water. Some young moose remained in the lick vicinity for 3 weeks or more, and often wandered in and out of the licks, grazing herbage as well as drinking. This suggested a social as well as a nutritional …

Dynamics, Movements, And Feeding Ecology Of A Newly Protected Wolf Population In Northwestern Minnesota, Steven H. Fritts, L. David Mech

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

The gray wolf Canis lupus occupies only about 1 percent of its former range in the lower 48 states (Mech 1974a). Most of the range is in northern Minnesota, where the resident population is classified as "threatened" by the U.S. Department of the Interior. Wolves have been and will continue to be the subject of considerable controversy in Minnesota.

The first scientific study of wolves in Minnesota was conducted by Olson (1938a,b). That and all subsequent re- search was in the Superior National Forest (SNF) of northeastern Minnesota even though wolves inhabit approximately the northern third of the state. Consequently, …

Radial-Maze Performance In The Rat Following Lesions Of Posterior Neocortex, Melvyn A. Goodale, Robert H.I. Dale

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

The present experiment was designed to investigate the role of posterior neocortex (areas 17, 18 and 18a) in the maintenance of performance on the radial maze. Following training to criterion on the 8-arm radial maze, rats received either sham operations, bilateral eye enucleations, lesions of posterior neocortex, or combined enucleations and lesions of posterior neocortex. While the enucleated animals with intact brains showed a slight, but significant performance decrement relative to the sham-operated group, the other two groups, with lesions of areas 17, 18 and 18a, each showed a massive deficit. This large deficit was observed even in the group …

Behavioural Budgeting By Wild Coyotes: The Influence Of Food Resources And Social Organization, Marc Bekoff, Michael C. Wells

Ethology Collection

Daytime behavioural budgets of coyotes (Canis latrans) living in the Grand Teton National Park Jackson, Wyoming, were analysed in order to determine how activity patterns ' ere influenced by food resources and social organization. In winter coyotes rested more-and hunted less than in other seasons. Pack-living coyotes rested more and travelled less than resident pairs or solitary resident or transients during winter months when the major food resource was ungulate (predominantly elk, Cervus canadensis) carrion. A mated female living in a pack rested significantly more and travelled significantly less than a mated female living only with her mate (as a …

Remembrance Of Places Lasts: Proactive Inhibition And Patterns Of Choice In Rat Spatial Memory, William A. Roberts, Robert H.I. Dale

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

A series of experiments was carried out to evaluate the notion that rats given a sequence of massed daily trials on the radial maze reset working memory at the end of each trial by deleting its contents. Although curves presented by D. S. Olton [Scientific American, 1977, 236, 82-98: In S. H. Hulse, H. Fowler, & W. K. Honig (Eds.), Cognitive processes in animal behavior, 1978, Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum] show that rats return to errorless performance at the beginning of each trial after the first, the fact that accuracy falls less rapidly over choices on Trial 1 …

Deer Social Organization And Wolf Predation In Northeastern Minnesota, Michael E. Nelson, L. David Mech

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

The white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus has been subject to intensive research and management, yet we are just beginning to understand its social organization. Little is known about home range formation, migration, social bonds, and traditions in this deer, what functions they serve, and what selective forces have affected them.

Predation by wolves Canis lupus, in particular, has not been examined as a factor in deer evolution, yet the intimate interactions between deer and wolf through the millennia no doubt strongly influenced major morphological and behavioral adaptations in both species. It is a reasonable assumption that wolf predation has been …

An Observational Study Of Scent-Marking In Coyotes, Canis Latrans, Michael C. Wells, Marc Bekoff

Ethology Collection

Urination and defaecation patterns of free-ranging coyotes (Canis latrans) were studied in the Grand Teton National Park, Jackson, Wyoming, for two years. The vast majority of urinations by adult males and females were involved in 'marking,' and differentiating between 'marking' and 'elimination' may not be necessary. Our results may be summarized as follows: 1) Raised-leg urinations (RLU) performed by males were most frequently used in marking. (2) Females marked throughout the year using the squat (SQU) posture. (3) Snow tracking and reading snow sign resulted in a gross underestimate of the relative frequency of SQU's and a large overestimate in …

An Observational Study Of Coyote (Canis Latrans) Scent-Marking And Territoriality In Yellowstone National Park, Joseph J. Allen, Marc Bekoff, Robert L. Crabtree

Ethology Collection

Free-ranging coyotes (Canis latrans) living in neighboring packs were observed in the Lamar Valley of Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, from Jan. to May 1997. Through direct observation, we recorded the location of coyote scent marks and information regarding the identity of the marking animal. Patterns of scent-marking were then analyzed spatially and demographically. All of the evidence from the present study supports a strong relationship between scent-marking and territoriality in these coyotes, and all predictions were met. A preponderance of scent marks was found in the periphery of territories. Most of those marks were raised-leg urinations (RLUs) and forward-lean urinations …

Food Habits Of Largemouth Bass, Micropterus Salmoides (Lacepede) And Spotted Bass, Micropterus Punctulatus (Rafinesque), From Beech Fork Reservoir, A New Impoundment In Wayne And Cabell Counties, West Virginia, Michael A. Arcuri

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

A study was undertaken to determine the food habits of two game fishes, the largemouth bass Micropterus salmoides (Lacepede) and the spotted bass M. punctulatus (Rafinesque) in Beech Fork Reservoir shortly after its impoundment. A total of 171 largemouth bass and 95 spotted bass were collected from July 1978, through June 1979, and their stomach contents analyzed.

Largemouth bass fed primarily on fishes, particularly young-of-the-year bluegill. Aquatic and terrestrial invertebrates were also important food items, especially during the spring and fall . The dominant aquatic forms were chironomid larvae and pupae while the dominant terrestrial forms were adult dipterans.

Spotted …

Abnormal Behavior As An Indication Of Immaterial Suffering, Hans Hinrich Sambraus

Sentience Collection

Reactive abnormal behavior is the convincing proof of immaterial suffering for the ethologist. We consider abnormal that behavior which does not correspond to, or is without object, which appears with sharply increased or decreased frequency, or which is abnormal in its motor pattern. Moreover, much reactive abnormal behavior manifests itself in stereotypies, i.e., the movement is repeated continuously in the same way. Among wild animals and in traditional forms of animal production abnormal behavior is unknown. However, it is encountered often in animals in intensive husbandry systems, and it can be demonstrated that abnormal behavior is actually brought about by …

The Buller-Steer Syndrome, Richard Ulbrich

Ethology Collection

Bulling among steers is an abnormal behavioral trait and is a common health and economic problem in feedlot operations. Factors associated with the buller-steer syndrome are hormonal implantation, seasonality and environmental conditions, stress, overcrowding, and social interaction between individuals. Research has examined relationships between these and other factors and buller occurrence. Boredom of feedlot cattle may contribute to buller occurrence and other undesirable behavior more than we might suspect. Research is needed to determine the feasibility of enriching the environment of penned livestock in general, the goal of which would be, in theory, the elimination of undesirable behavior as well …

Equine Behavior Problems In Relation To Humane Management, Katherine A. Houpt

Equines Collection

The behavior problems of horses are frequently related to management practices. Behaviors that are termed stall vices appear to be either stereotyped behaviors that occur in reaction to stress, or patterns that emerge when natural behaviors such as grazing are prevented. The behavior cases presented to the New York State College of Veterinary Medicine, Cornell University, were tabulated: 27% were stall vices and 27% were some form of aggression. The stall vices were circling, digging, kicking the stall, chewing wood, swallowing air or self-mutilation. Management of horses on pasture rather than in stalls prevents the development of many of these …

The Foods And Associated Feeding Behavior Of The Yellow-Bellied Marmot, Marmota Flaviventris, Mark William Jonasson

Theses Digitization Project

No abstract provided.

Giving-Up As A Poisson Process: The Departure Decision Of The Green Lacewing, Alan B. Bond

Alan Bond Publications

Predators that forage for aggregated prey appear to require a decision rule for determining the point at which to discontinue their search in a given prey patch and move on to another. Although the optimum rule depends heavily on features of the searching behavior of the predator and the distribution of the prey (Oaten 1977), most previous authors have assumed that the decision must involve an assessment of the capture rate within a patch and a comparison with the mean capture rate in the environment as a whole (Krebs 1978). When the perceived quality of the given patch becomes significantly …

Spatial Memory And The Performance Of Rats And Pigeons In The Radial-Arm Maze, Alan B. Bond, Robert G. Cook, Marvin R. Lamb

Papers in Behavior in Biological Sciences

The resource-distribution hypothesis states that the ability of an animal to remember the spatial location of past events is related to the typical distribution of food resources for the species. It appears to predict that Norway rats would perform better than domestic pigeons in tasks requiring spatial event memory. Pigeons, tested in an eight-arm radial maze, exhibited no more than half of the memory capacity observed in rats in the same apparatus and may not have used spatial memory at all. The results were interpreted as supporting the hypothesis.

A Review Of The Behavioural Mechanism Of Milk Ejection Of The Domestic Pig, David Fraser

Feeding Behavior Collection

The domestic pig has complex nursing and suckling behaviour, consisting of several distinct phases of suckling by the piglets and a characteristic pattern of grunting by the sow. A review of observations and experimental findings suggests cause-and-effect relationships between the different elements of sow and piglet behaviour, and the relationship of the behaviour to milk ejection. Characteristic features of pig nursing and suckling behaviour are interpreted as an adaptation promoting even distribution of milk among a number of precocious litter-mates.

The Social Ecology Of Coyotes, Marc Bekoff, Michael C. Wells

Ethology Collection

No abstract provided.

Population Regulation In Wolves, Jane M. Packard, L. David Mech

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

The possibility of social regulation of wolf populations has been discussed in the literature for several years. Some of the first ecological studies of wolves indicated that their populations did not increase as rapidly as was theoretically possible, and that they reached a saturation point apparently not set by food. Subsequent captive studies demonstrated the existence of social mechanisms possibly capable of regulating population growth. However, the importance of these factors in wild populations has not been established. This paper has four objectives: (1) to evaluate the existing concept of "intrinsic limitation," (2) to propose that wolf population dynamics may …

Optimal Foraging In A Uniform Habitat: The Search Mechanism Of The Green Lacewing, Alan B. Bond

Alan Bond Publications

The effects of food deprivation and prey contact on the components of searching behavior in larval green lacewings (Chrysopa carnea Stephens) were examined to test the applicability of optimal foraging theory to predation in a uniform habitat. Variation in foraging intensity was primarily the result of changes in the meander. Modulation of the response to prey contact with increasing deprivation involved changes in the velocity and the response persistence and suggested the occurrence of adaptation to inferred differences in the spatial distribution of the prey. The ratio of giving-up times at different levels of deprivation was in accordance with …

Morphological Variation Among 14 Species Of Callogobius Bleeker (Pisces: Gobiidae), James Francis Mckinney

Biological Sciences Theses & Dissertations

A survey of the variation among the species of the Callogobius complex has been accomplished in order to determine if recognition of more than one genus is warranted for this assemblage of species. Emphasis has been placed on the osteological variation. Relationships among certain species within the Callogobius complex have been exposed. Although there are two well defined species groups within the complex, it is felt that inclusion of all of the examined species within the single genus Callogobius is the most parsimonious course of action.

Concurrent Drinking By Pigeons On Fixed-Interval Reinforcement Schedules, Robert H.I. Dale

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Three experienced pigeons were exposed to at least ten consecutive 100-min sessions on each of three food-reinforced fixed-interval (FI) schedules: FI 50-sec, FI 100-sec and FI 200-sec. Water was freely available. Drinking was largely confined to the first third of each fixed interval, and the mean sessional water intake was directly related to the food-reinforcement rate for each animal. The animals drank very quickly, i.e., 3-4 ml/sec, but the drinking bouts were brief, i.e., 0.8-1.4 sec, and infrequent, i.e., 2-5/hr. The parameters describing concurrent drinking in the pigeon are strikingly different from those describing rats’ drinking under similar reinforcement schedules, …

Structure Of A Subtidal Benthic Community Near Cape Charles, Virginia, R. Michael Ewing

Biological Sciences Theses & Dissertations

Species composition, distribution, and abundance of benthic invertebrates of a subtidal community were examined at a location on the lower Delmarva Peninsula near Cape Charles, Virginia. Macrobenthos was sampled quarterly between June, 1977 and June, 1978 at nine sites along a transect in Old Plantation Creek and the adjacent offshore area. Spatial and temporal patterns of numerically important species are discussed.

Sampling sites and species were grouped by a numerical classification strategy which consisted of the Bray-Curtis similarity measure and group-average clustering. Three faunal assemblages were identified with the aid of constancy and fidelity nodal analyses: (1) a tidal creek …

Swimming As A Determinate To Immigration For Two Small Mammals In Coastal Virginia, Jeffrey Lewis Carter

Biological Sciences Theses & Dissertations

Small mammals were live trapped on the mainland and on an island located in the southeast corner of Virginia. The area was characterized by a mid-Atlantic coastal climate. White-footed mice (Perompsous fsucopus) were trapped on the mainland but not on the island, whereas meadow voles (Microtus psnnsylvimious) inhabited only the island. A series of swimming tests were performed in both the field and in the laboratory on both of these species to determine if swimming abilities could be the factor preventing Pszomysous from colonizing the island.

Both species of small mammals showed good swimming endurance in …