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Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding

Coercive mate guarding, where males use aggression to control female movements, is a form of sexual coercion which functions to constrain female mate choice. Non-human primates, for example, herd females to keep them away from competing males, but male bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus) also her...

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Autores principales: King, Stephanie L., Allen, Simon J., Krützen, Michael, Connor, Richard C.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6834747/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31317352
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10071-019-01290-1
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author King, Stephanie L.
Allen, Simon J.
Krützen, Michael
Connor, Richard C.
author_facet King, Stephanie L.
Allen, Simon J.
Krützen, Michael
Connor, Richard C.
author_sort King, Stephanie L.
collection PubMed
description Coercive mate guarding, where males use aggression to control female movements, is a form of sexual coercion which functions to constrain female mate choice. Non-human primates, for example, herd females to keep them away from competing males, but male bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus) also herd females to keep them close to their alliance partners. Indeed, pairs and trios of male dolphins work together to sequester single estrus females and defend them from competing alliances. Yet how males facilitate such coordination remains unknown. Here, we investigate the vocal behaviour of allied male bottlenose dolphins during the herding of individual females, examining how the production of whistles and ‘pops’ (a threat vocalisation) varied with behavioural state and inter-animal distances. Allied males produced both whistles and pops significantly more often and at higher rates during social interactions, though they differed in function. Whistle rates increased significantly when new individuals joined the consorting group, consistent with previous work showing that whistles are part of a greeting sequence for this species. Whistle matching also appeared to play a role in within-alliance coordination. Pop vocalisations increased significantly when the nearest male to the female changed, likely inducing the female to remain close as the males coordinate a guard switch. Building upon prior research examining female movements in response to pops, we show that males approach the female and current guard whilst popping, leading to a guard switch. Our results provide new insights into the use of vocal signals during cooperative mate guarding between allied male dolphins. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s10071-019-01290-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
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spelling pubmed-68347472019-11-20 Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding King, Stephanie L. Allen, Simon J. Krützen, Michael Connor, Richard C. Anim Cogn Original Paper Coercive mate guarding, where males use aggression to control female movements, is a form of sexual coercion which functions to constrain female mate choice. Non-human primates, for example, herd females to keep them away from competing males, but male bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus) also herd females to keep them close to their alliance partners. Indeed, pairs and trios of male dolphins work together to sequester single estrus females and defend them from competing alliances. Yet how males facilitate such coordination remains unknown. Here, we investigate the vocal behaviour of allied male bottlenose dolphins during the herding of individual females, examining how the production of whistles and ‘pops’ (a threat vocalisation) varied with behavioural state and inter-animal distances. Allied males produced both whistles and pops significantly more often and at higher rates during social interactions, though they differed in function. Whistle rates increased significantly when new individuals joined the consorting group, consistent with previous work showing that whistles are part of a greeting sequence for this species. Whistle matching also appeared to play a role in within-alliance coordination. Pop vocalisations increased significantly when the nearest male to the female changed, likely inducing the female to remain close as the males coordinate a guard switch. Building upon prior research examining female movements in response to pops, we show that males approach the female and current guard whilst popping, leading to a guard switch. Our results provide new insights into the use of vocal signals during cooperative mate guarding between allied male dolphins. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s10071-019-01290-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2019-07-17 2019 /pmc/articles/PMC6834747/ /pubmed/31317352 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10071-019-01290-1 Text en © The Author(s) 2019 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
spellingShingle Original Paper
King, Stephanie L.
Allen, Simon J.
Krützen, Michael
Connor, Richard C.
Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding
title Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding
title_full Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding
title_fullStr Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding
title_full_unstemmed Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding
title_short Vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding
title_sort vocal behaviour of allied male dolphins during cooperative mate guarding
topic Original Paper
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6834747/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31317352
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10071-019-01290-1
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