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Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey

Biological invasions can modify the behaviour of vulnerable native species in subtle ways. For example, native predators may learn or evolve to reduce foraging in conditions (habitats, times of day) that expose them to a toxic invasive species. In tropical Australia, freshwater crocodiles (Crocodylu...

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Autores principales: Aiyer, Abhilasha, Shine, Richard, Somaweera, Ruchira, Bell, Tina, Ward-Fear, Georgia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8786828/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35075144
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-03629-6
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author Aiyer, Abhilasha
Shine, Richard
Somaweera, Ruchira
Bell, Tina
Ward-Fear, Georgia
author_facet Aiyer, Abhilasha
Shine, Richard
Somaweera, Ruchira
Bell, Tina
Ward-Fear, Georgia
author_sort Aiyer, Abhilasha
collection PubMed
description Biological invasions can modify the behaviour of vulnerable native species in subtle ways. For example, native predators may learn or evolve to reduce foraging in conditions (habitats, times of day) that expose them to a toxic invasive species. In tropical Australia, freshwater crocodiles (Crocodylus johnstoni) are often fatally poisoned when they ingest invasive cane toads (Rhinella marina). The risk may be greatest if toads are seized on land, where a predator cannot wash away the toxins before they are absorbed into its bloodstream. Hence, toad invasion might induce crocodiles to forage in aquatic habitats only, foregoing terrestrial hunting. To test this idea, we conducted standardised trials of bait presentation to free-ranging crocodiles in sites with and without invasive toads. As anticipated, crocodiles rapidly learned to avoid consuming toads, and shifted to almost exclusively aquatic foraging.
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spelling pubmed-87868282022-01-25 Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey Aiyer, Abhilasha Shine, Richard Somaweera, Ruchira Bell, Tina Ward-Fear, Georgia Sci Rep Article Biological invasions can modify the behaviour of vulnerable native species in subtle ways. For example, native predators may learn or evolve to reduce foraging in conditions (habitats, times of day) that expose them to a toxic invasive species. In tropical Australia, freshwater crocodiles (Crocodylus johnstoni) are often fatally poisoned when they ingest invasive cane toads (Rhinella marina). The risk may be greatest if toads are seized on land, where a predator cannot wash away the toxins before they are absorbed into its bloodstream. Hence, toad invasion might induce crocodiles to forage in aquatic habitats only, foregoing terrestrial hunting. To test this idea, we conducted standardised trials of bait presentation to free-ranging crocodiles in sites with and without invasive toads. As anticipated, crocodiles rapidly learned to avoid consuming toads, and shifted to almost exclusively aquatic foraging. Nature Publishing Group UK 2022-01-24 /pmc/articles/PMC8786828/ /pubmed/35075144 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-03629-6 Text en © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) .
spellingShingle Article
Aiyer, Abhilasha
Shine, Richard
Somaweera, Ruchira
Bell, Tina
Ward-Fear, Georgia
Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey
title Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey
title_full Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey
title_fullStr Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey
title_full_unstemmed Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey
title_short Shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey
title_sort shifts in the foraging tactics of crocodiles following invasion by toxic prey
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8786828/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35075144
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-03629-6
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