Records |
Author |
Nuñez, C.M.V.; Adelman, J.S.; Smith, J.; Gesquiere, L.R.; Rubenstein, D.I. |
Title |
Linking social environment and stress physiology in feral mares (Equus caballus): Group transfers elevate fecal cortisol levels |
Type |
Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
General and Comparative Endocrinology |
Abbreviated Journal |
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Volume |
196 |
Issue |
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Pages |
26-33 |
Keywords |
Equus caballus; Fecal cortisol; Feral mare; Group transfer; Stress; Social instability |
Abstract |
Abstract Feral horses (Equus caballus) have a complex social structure, the stability of which is important to their overall health. Behavioral and demographic research has shown that decreases in group (or band) stability reduce female fitness, but the potential effects on the physiological stress response have not been demonstrated. To fully understand how band stability affects group-member fitness, we need to understand not only behavioral and demographic, but also physiological consequences of decreases to that stability. We studied group changes in feral mares (an activity that induces instability, including both male and female aggression) on Shackleford Banks, NC. We found that mares in the midst of changing groups exhibit increased fecal cortisol levels. In addition, mares making more group transfers show higher levels of cortisol two weeks post-behavior. These results offer insights into how social instability is integrated into an animal’s physiological phenotype. In addition, our results have important implications for feral horse management. On Shackleford Banks, mares contracepted with porcine zona pellucida (PZP) make approximately 10 times as many group changes as do untreated mares. Such animals may therefore be at higher risk of chronic stress. These results support the growing consensus that links between behavior and physiological stress must be taken into account when managing for healthy, functional populations. |
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0016-6480 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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5743 |
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Author |
Krueger, K.; Flauger, B.; Farmer, K.; Hemelrijk, C. |
Title |
Movement initiation in groups of feral horses |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Behavioural Processes |
Abbreviated Journal |
Behav. Process. |
Volume |
103 |
Issue |
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Pages |
91-101 |
Keywords |
Horse; Equus ferus caballus; Distributed leadership; Herding; Departure; Rank |
Abstract |
Abstract Herds of ungulates, flocks of birds, swarms of insects and schools of fish move in coordinated groups. Computer models show that only one or very few animals are needed to initiate and direct movement. To investigate initiation mechanisms further, we studied two ways in which movement can be initiated in feral horses: herding, and departure from the group. We examined traits affecting the likelihood of a horse initiating movement i.e. social rank, affiliative relationships, spatial position, and social network. We also investigated whether group members join a movement in dominance rank order. Our results show that whereas herding is exclusive to alpha males, any group member may initiate movement by departure. Social bonds, the number of animals interacted with, and the spatial position were not significantly associated with movement initiation. We did not find movement initiation by departure to be exclusive to any type of individual. Instead we find evidence for a limited form of distributed leadership, with higher ranking animals being followed more often. |
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0376-6357 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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5738 |
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Author |
Austin, N.P.; Rogers, L.J. |
Title |
Lateralization of agonistic and vigilance responses in Przewalski horses (Equus przewalskii) |
Type |
Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Applied Animal Behaviour Science |
Abbreviated Journal |
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Volume |
151 |
Issue |
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Pages |
43-50 |
Keywords |
Behavioural lateralization: Eye preference; Limb preference; Aggression; Vigilance; Reactivity; Przewalski horses |
Abstract |
tEye and limb preferences were scored in the closest undomesticated relative of Equuscaballus using the same methods as used previously to study laterality in feral horses.Observations were made of 33 Przewalski horses (Equus ferus przewalskii) (male N = 20,female N = 13) living under natural social conditions on a large reserve in France. Signifi-cant left-eye/side biases were found in agonistic interactions within harem bands (M ± SEbias to left 58% ± 0.01 for threats, P < 0.001; 68% ± 0.05 for attacks; P < 0.001) and in stallionfights (threats, 52% ± 0.01 left, P < 0.001; attacks, 63% ± 0.02 left, P < 0.001): as many as 80%of the horses were significantly lateralized in attack responses within harem bands. Lat-erality of vigilance was measured as lifting up the head from grazing and turning it to theleft or right side: a directional bias to the left was found (M ± SE 53% ± 0.02 left, P < 0.001).Side bias in reactivity was calculated as the percent of head lifts above the level of thewithers on the left or right side and this was also left side biased (M ± SE 73% ± 0.03 left,P < 0.001). These results indicate right-hemisphere specialization for control of aggressionand responses to novelty. The left bias in attack scores within harem bands was strongerin males than females (P = 0.024) and in immature than adult horses (P = 0.032). Immaturehorses were also more strongly lateralized than adults in vigilance scores (P = 0.022), whichmay suggest that experience reduces these side biases. Our results show that Przewalskihorses exhibit left eye preferences, as do feral horses, and do so even more strongly thanferal horses. Considering feral and Przewalski horses together, we deduce that ancestralhorses had similar lateral biases. Also similar to feral horses, the Przewalski horses showedno significant forelimb preference at the group level or in the majority of horses at theindividual level, confirming the hypothesis that previously reported limb preferences indomestic breeds are entrained or generated by breed-specific selection. |
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0168-1591 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
Serial |
5768 |
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Author |
Jennings, D.J. |
Title |
Limited evidence that visual lateralization is associated with fitness in rutting male fallow deer |
Type |
Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
Volume |
92 |
Issue |
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Pages |
85-91 |
Keywords |
aggression; contest behaviour; Dama dama; fallow deer; lateral display; lateralization; mating success; third-party intervention behaviour |
Abstract |
Under certain models of animal competition, individuals are expected to gather information about opponent quality in order to determine whether they should fight or withdraw. However, the ability to process complex information differs between individuals and across brain hemispheres: a feature of vertebrate cognition known as lateralization that is not anticipated by contest models. I investigated the relationship between aggressive behaviour and mating success during the fallow deer, Dama dama, rut and a measure of lateralization derived from eye preference during parallel walking. Results show that there was no relationship between the tendency to escalate to fighting or predictability in the tendency to engage in fighting and lateralization. Conversely, there was a quadratic relationship between third-party intervention behaviour and lateralization: the greater the tendency to intervene in ongoing fights the lower the degree of lateralization. However, individuals that showed lateralization for right-eye use were least likely to be targeted by the intervening male; thus lateralization is beneficial in this context because targeted males are highly likely to lose this subsequent encounter. The relationship between lateralization and mating success was also nonlinear: males that showed little evidence for an eye bias during lateral displays had the greatest mating success. Taken together, individuals that showed lateralization benefited from avoiding being targeted after third-party intervention; conversely, individuals that showed little evidence for lateralization actively intervened during ongoing fights and had higher mating success. These results suggest that, although lateralization does appear to confer a fitness advantage on individuals, this is not as extensive as anticipated. |
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0003-3472 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
Serial |
5802 |
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Author |
Wolter, R.; Pantel, N.; Stefanski, V.; Möstl, E.; Krueger, K. |
Title |
The role of an alpha animal in changing environmental conditions |
Type |
Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Physiology & Behavior |
Abbreviated Journal |
Physiol. Behav. |
Volume |
133 |
Issue |
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Pages |
236-243 |
Keywords |
Alpha male; Horse; Equus ferus przewalskii; Bachelor group; Group structure |
Abstract |
Abstract The maintenance and development of conservation areas by grazing of large herbivores, such as Przewalski's horses, is common practice. Several nature conservation areas house male bachelor groups of this species. When males are needed for breeding they are removed from the groups, often without considering group compositions and individual social positions. However, alpha animals are needed for ensuring group stability and decision making in potentially dangerous situations in several species. To investigate the role of the alpha male in a bachelor group, we observed the behaviour of five Przewalski's horse males during the enlargement of their enclosure. We analyzed the group's social structure and movement orders, as well as the animals' connectedness, activity budgets, and whether they moved with preferred group members and how factors such as social rank influenced the horses' behaviour. We also investigated the excretion of glucocorticoid metabolites (GCM) via faeces of the horses while exploring a new area as a parameter of glucocorticoid production. Our results show that the alpha male is important for a bachelor group in changing environmental conditions. The alpha male had the highest level of connectedness within the group. When exploring the new environment, its position in the group changed from previously being the last to being the first. Furthermore the whole group behaviour changed when exploring the new area. The stallions showed reduced resting behavior, increased feeding and did not stay close to each other. We found that the excretion of glucocorticoid metabolites of most horses rose only marginally during the first days on the new area while only the alpha male showed a significant increased amount of glucocorticoid production during the first day of the enclosure enlargement. |
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0031-9384 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
Serial |
5818 |
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Author |
Duboscq, J.; Agil, M.; Engelhardt, A.; Thierry, B. |
Title |
The function of postconflict interactions: new prospects from the study of a tolerant species of primate |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Animal Behaviour |
Abbreviated Journal |
Anim. Behav. |
Volume |
87 |
Issue |
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Pages |
107-120 |
Keywords |
aggression; anxiety; conflict management; female; Macaca nigra; reconciliation; social tolerance; third-party interaction |
Abstract |
Aggression can generate anxiety, create uncertainty about its aftermath and jeopardise social relationships. Postconflict interactions serve as conflict management strategies to mitigate these consequences. Whereas postconflict interactions are well characterized in many animals, their functions are still insufficiently investigated. Four functional hypotheses have been proposed: stress reduction, relationship repair, self-protection and benign intent. We aimed to test these hypotheses in females of a tolerant macaque species, the crested macaque, Macaca nigra, under natural conditions, for three postconflict interactions: reconciliation, affiliation and aggression with third parties. Our results provide meaningful contrasts compared with findings in other species. We found no evidence that aggression had consequences for individuals' behavioural indicators of anxiety, although it increased the likelihood of secondary aggression with third parties. There was little evidence for the stress reduction hypothesis as the occurrence of any of the three postconflict interactions investigated had little effect on the measured behavioural indicators of anxiety. Conflict and dyad characteristics also had limited influence on anxiety. The relationship repair function was only partly validated: dyads with stronger bonds or that exchanged more support did not reconcile more often, but dyads with attributes related to the symmetry, stability and predictability (i.e. security) within relationships did. Patterns of initiation and directionality of postconflict interactions in this study population suggest that reconciliation may constitute the signalling of appeasement and benign intent. Furthermore, we found that aggression towards third parties may serve as a source of self-protection and reassertion of the females' social status. The distinctive pattern of postconflict management strategies revealed in wild female crested macaques appears to be related to their typically tolerant social style. These results demonstrate the usefulness of concomitantly studying aggression, postconflict interactions and their functions, to understand conflict management strategies comprehensively, while taking into account the level of social tolerance characterizing the studied society. |
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0003-3472 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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5889 |
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Author |
Briefer, E.F.; Haque, S.; Baciadonna, L.; McElligott, A.G. |
Title |
Goats excel at learning and remembering a highly novel cognitive task |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Frontiers in Zoology |
Abbreviated Journal |
Front. Zool. |
Volume |
11 |
Issue |
1 |
Pages |
20 |
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Abstract |
The computational demands of sociality (maintaining group cohesion, reducing conflict) and ecological problems (extractive foraging, memorizing resource locations) are the main drivers proposed to explain the evolution cognition. Different predictions follow, about whether animals would preferentially learn new tasks socially or not, but the prevalent view today is that intelligent species should excel at social learning. However, the predictions were originally used to explain primate cognition, and studies of species with relatively smaller brains are rare. By contrast, domestication has often led to a decrease in brain size, which could affect cognition. In domestic animals, the relaxed selection pressures compared to a wild environment could have led to reduced social and physical cognition. Goats possess several features commonly associated with advanced cognition, such as successful colonization of new environments and complex fission-fusion societies. Here, we assessed goat social and physical cognition as well as long-term memory of a complex two-step foraging task (food box cognitive challenge), in order to investigate some of the main selection pressures thought to affect the evolution of ungulate cognition. |
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1742-9994 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ Briefer2014 |
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6376 |
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Author |
Cozzi, B.; Povinelli, M.; Ballarin, C.; Granato, A. |
Title |
The Brain of the Horse: Weight and Cephalization Quotients |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Brain, Behavior and Evolution |
Abbreviated Journal |
Brain Behav Evol |
Volume |
83 |
Issue |
1 |
Pages |
9-16 |
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Abstract |
The horse is a common domestic animal whose anatomy has been studied since the XVI century. However, a modern neuroanatomy of this species does not exist and most of the data utilized in textbooks and reviews derive from single specimens or relatively old literature. Here, we report information on the brain of Equus caballus obtained by sampling 131 horses, including brain weight (as a whole and subdivided into its constituents), encephalization quotient (EQ), and cerebellar quotient (CQ), and comparisons with what is known about other relevant species. The mean weight of the fresh brains in our experimental series was 598.63 g (SEM ± 7.65), with a mean body weight of 514.12 kg (SEM ± 15.42). The EQ was 0.78 and the CQ was 0.841. The data we obtained indicate that the horse possesses a large, convoluted brain, with a weight similar to that of other hoofed species of like mass. However, the shape of the brain, the noteworthy folding of the neocortex, and the peculiar longitudinal distribution of the gyri suggest an evolutionary specificity at least partially separate from that of the Cetartiodactyla (even-toed mammals and cetaceans) with whom Perissodactyla (odd-toed mammals) are often grouped. |
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0006-8977 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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6592 |
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Author |
Wathan, J.; McComb, K. |
Title |
The eyes and ears are visual indicators of attention in domestic horses |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
Publication |
Current Biology |
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24 |
Issue |
15 |
Pages |
R677-R679 |
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Summary Sensitivity to the attentional states of others has adaptive advantages [1], and in social animals, attending to others is important for predator detection, as well as a pre-requisite for normal social functioning and more complex socio-cognitive abilities [2]. Despite widespread interest in how social species perceive attention in others, studies of non-human animals have been inconclusive about the detailed cues involved [3]. Previous work has focused on head and eye direction, overlooking the fact that many mammals have obvious and mobile ears that could act as a visual cue to attention. Here we report that horses use the head orientation of a conspecific to locate food, but that this ability is disrupted when parts of the face (the eyes and ears) are covered up with naturalistic masks. The ability to correctly judge attention also interacted with the identity of the model horse, suggesting that individual differences in facial features may influence the salience of cues. Our results indicate that a combination of head orientation with facial expression, specifically involving both the eyes and ears, is necessary for communicating social attention. These findings emphasise that in order to understand how attention is communicated in non-human animals, it is essential to consider a broad range of cues. |
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0960-9822 |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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5929 |
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Author |
Wittig, R.M.; Crockford, C.; Langergraber, K.E.; Zuberbühler, K. |
Title |
Triadic social interactions operate across time: a field experiment with wild chimpanzees |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2014 |
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Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences |
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Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B |
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281 |
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1779 |
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Social animals cooperate with bonding partners to outcompete others. Predicting a competitor's supporter is likely to be beneficial, regardless of whether the supporting relationship is stable or transient, or whether the support happens immediately or later. Although humans make such predictions frequently, it is unclear to what extent animals have the cognitive abilities to recognize others’ transient bond partners and to predict others' coalitions that extend beyond the immediate present. We conducted playback experiments with wild chimpanzees to test this. About 2 h after fighting, subjects heard recordings of aggressive barks of a bystander, who was or was not a bond partner of the former opponent. Subjects looked longer and moved away more often from barks of the former opponents’ bond partners than non-bond partners. In an additional experiment, subjects moved away more from barks than socially benign calls of the same bond partner. These effects were present despite differences in genetic relatedness and considerable time delays between the two events. Chimpanzees, it appears, integrate memories of social interactions from different sources to make inferences about current interactions. This ability is crucial for connecting triadic social interactions across time, a requirement for predicting aggressive support even after a time delay. |
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Equine Behaviour @ team @ |
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