Antipredator responses of California ground squirrels to rattlesnakes and rattling sounds: The roles of sex, reproductive parity, and offspring age in assessment and decision-making rules

Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology

Volumn 55, Issue 1, 2003, Pages 22-31

  Swaisgood, Ronald R ^a,c   Rowe, Matthew P ^b   Owings, Donald H ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

^b APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^c ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF SAN DIEGO   (United States)

Author keywords

Antipredator assessment; Offspring value; Offspring vulnerability; Parental defense; Sciuridae

Indexed keywords

ANTIPREDATOR DEFENSE; PREDATION RISK; PREDATOR-PREY INTERACTION; REPRODUCTIVE STATUS; RISK ASSESSMENT; SEX-RELATED DIFFERENCE;

AVES; CROTALUS; CROTALUS VIRIDIS; CROTALUS VIRIDIS OREGANUS; MAMMALIA; SCIURIDAE; SERPENTES; SPERMOPHILUS; SPERMOPHILUS BEECHEYI;

EID: 0242658510     PISSN: 03405443     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1007/s00265-003-0684-2     Document Type: Article

References (52)

1. Andersson M, Wiklund CG, Rundgren H (1980) Parental defence of offspring: a model and an example. Anim Behav 28:536-542
2. Archer J (1988) The behavioural biology of aggression. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
3. Blumstein DT, Steinmetz J, Armitage KB, Daniel JC (1997) Alarm calling in yellow-bellied marmots: II. The importance of direct fitness. Anim Behav 53:173-184
4. Boellstorff DE, Owings DH, Penedo MCT, Hersek MJ (1994) Reproductive behaviour and multiple paternity of California ground squirrels. Anim Behav 47:1057-1064
5. Buitron D (1983) Variability in the response of black-billed magpies to natural predators. Behaviour 87:209-236
6. Bures S, Pavel V (1997) The effects of nestling condition on risk-taking in meadow pipits. Anim Behav 54:1531-1534
7. Clutton-Brock (1991) The evolution of parental care. Princeton University Press, Princeton
8. Coleman RM, Gross MR, Sargent RC (1985) Parental investment decision rules: a test in bluegill sunfish. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 18:59-66
9. Coss RG, Owings DH (1985) Restraints on ground squirrel antipredator behavior: adjustments over multiple time scales. In: Johnston TD, Pietrewicz AT (eds) Issues in the ecological study of learning. Erlbaum, Hillsdale, N.J., pp 167-200
10. Curio E (1978) The adaptive significance of avian mobbing: I. Teleonomic hypotheses and predictions. Z Tierpsychol 48:175-183
11. Curio E, Regelmann D (1985) The behavioural dynamics of great tits (Parus major) approaching a predator. Z Tierpsychol 69:3-18
12. Davies NB, Halliday TR (1978) Deep croaks and fighting assessment in toads Bufo bufo. Nature 274:683-685
13. Enquist M, Leimar O, Ljungberg T, Mallner Y, Segerdahl N (1990) A test of the sequential assessment game: fighting in the cichlid fish Nannacara anomala. Anim Behav 40:1-14
14. Fitch HS (1949) Study of snake populations in central California. Am Midl Nat 41:513-579
15. Greenwald OE (1974) Thermal dependence of striking and prey capture by gopher snakes. Copeia 1974:141-148
16. Greig-Smith PW (1980) Parental investment in nest defence by stonechats (Saxicola torquata). Anim Behav 28:604-619
17. Hasson O (1991) Pursuit-deterrent signals: communication between prey and predator. Trends Ecol Evol 6:325-329
18. Hauser MD (1988) Variation in maternal responsiveness in free-ranging vervet monkeys: a response to infant mortality risk. Am Nat 131:573-587
19. Hennessy DF, Owings DH (1988) Rattlesnakes create a context for localizing their search for potential prey. Ethology 77:317-329
20. Hersek MJ (1990) Behavior of predator and prey in a highly coevolved system: northern Pacific rattlesnakes and California ground squirrels. PhD thesis, University of California, Davis
21. Hersek MJ, Owings DH (1993) Tail flagging by adult California ground squirrels: a tonic signal that serves different functions for males and females. Anim Behav 46:129-138
22. Keppel G (1991) Design and analysis: a researcher's handbook, 3rd edn. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.
23. Linsdale JM (1946) The California ground squirrel. University of California Press, Berkeley
24. Loughry WJ (1987) The dynamics of snake harassment by black-tailed prairie dogs. Behaviour 103:27-48
25. Loughry WJ (1993) Determinants of time allocation by adult and yearling black-tailed prairie dogs. Behaviour 124:23-43
26. Loughry WJ, McDonough CM (1988) Calling and vigilance in California ground squirrels: a test of the tonic communication hypothesis. Anim Behav 36:1533-1540
27. Michl G, Török J, Garamszegi LZ, Tóth L (2000) Sex-dependent risk-taking in the collared flycatcher, Ficedula albicollis, when exposed to a predator at the nestling stage. Anim Behav 59:623-628
28. Montgomerie RD, Weatherhead PJ (1988) Risks and rewards of nest defence by parent birds. Q Rev Biol 63:167-187
29. Ostermeyer MC (1983) Maternal aggression. In: Elwood RW (ed) Parental behaviour of rodents. Wiley, Chichester, pp 151-179
30. Owings DH, Coss RG (1977) Snake mobbing by California ground squirrels: adaptive variation and ontogeny. Behaviour 62:50-69
31. Owings DH, Morton ES (1998) Animal vocal communication: a new approach. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
32. Owings DH, Hennessy DF, Leger DW, Gladney AB (1986) Different functions of "alarm" calling for different time scales: a preliminary report on ground squirrels. Behaviour 99:101-116
33. Patterson TL, Petrinovich L, James DK (1980) Reproductive value and appropriateness of response to predators by white-crowned sparrows. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 7:227-234
34. Pavel V, Bures S (2001) Offspring age and nest defence: test of the feedback hypothesis in the meadow pipit. Anim Behav 61:297-303
35. Poran NS, Coss RG (1990) Development of antisnake defenses in California ground squirrels (Spermophilus beecheyi): I. Behavioral and immunological relationships. Behaviour 112:222-245
36. Poran NS, Coss RG, Benjamini E (1987) Resistance of California ground squirrels (Spermophilus beecheyi) to the venom of the northern Pacific rattlesnake (Crotalus viridis oreganus): a study of adaptive variation. Toxicon 25:767-777
37. Pressley PH (1981) Parental effort and the evolution of nest-guarding tactics in the threespine stickleback, Gasterosteus aculeatus L. Evolution 35:282-295
38. Randall JA, Matocq MD (1997) Why do kangaroo rats (Dipodomys spectabilis) footdrum at snakes? Behav Ecol 8:404-413
39. Rowe MP, Owings DH (1978) The meaning of the sound of rattling by rattlesnakes to California ground squirrels. Behaviour 66:252-267
40. Rowe MP, Owings DH (1990) Probing, assessment, and management during interactions between ground squirrels and rattlesnakes. Part 1: risks related to rattlesnake size and body temperature. Ethology 86:237-249
41. Rowe MP, Owings DH (1996) Probing, assessment and management during interactions between ground squirrels (Rodentia: Sciuridae) and rattlesnakes (Squamata: Viperidae). Part 2: cues afforded by rattlesnake rattling. Ethology 102:856-874
42. SAS (1999) SAS JMP version 3, SAS Institute, Cary, N.C.
43. Svare BB (1981) Maternal aggression in mammals. In: Gubernick DJ, Klopfer PH (eds) Parental care in mammals. Plenum, New York, pp 179-210
44. Swaisgood RR, Owings DH, Rowe MP (1999a) Confict and assessment in a predator-prey system: ground squirrels versus rattlesnakes. Anim Behav 57:1033-1044
45. Swaisgood RR, Rowe MP, Owings DH (1999b) Assessment of rattlesnake dangerousness by California ground squirrels: exploitation of cues from rattling sounds. Anim Behav 57:1301-1310
46. Tallamy DW (1982) Age specific maternal defense in Gargaphia solani (Hemiptera: Tingidae). Behav Ecol Sociobiol 11:7-11
47. Tamura N, Yong H-S (1993) Vocalizations in response to predators in three species of Malaysian Callosciureus (Sciuridae). J Mamm. 74:703-714
48. Towers SR, Coss RG (1990) Confronting snakes in the burrow: snake-species discrimination and antisnake tactics in two California ground squirrel populations. Ethology 84:177-192
49. Trivers RL (1972) Parental investment and sexual selection. In: Campbell B (ed) Sexual selection and the descent of man. Aldine, Chicago, pp 136-179
50. Winkler DW (1994) Anti-predator defence by neighbors as a responsive amplifier of parental defence in tree swallows. Anim Behav 47:595-605
51. Wolff JO (1985) Maternal aggression as a deterrent to infanticide in Peromyscus leucopus and P. maniculatus. Anim Behav 33:117-123
52. Woodland DJ, Jaafar Z, Knight M-L (1980) The "pursuit deterrent" function of alarm signals. Am Nat 115:748-753