Suricate alarm calls signal predator class and urgency

doi:10.1016/S1364-6613(00)01840-4

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Volume 6, Issue 2, 1 February 2002, Pages 55-57

https://doi.org/10.1016/S1364-6613(00)01840-4 Get rights and content

Abstract

Human speech encodes both referential and affective information, but evidence for a similar phenomenon in animal vocalizations has been lacking. Recent work on suricates, an African mongoose, shows that animal alarm calls simultaneously encode information about both predator type and the signaler's perception of urgency.

Section snippets

Preditor-specific alarm calls

Suricates are diurnal, cooperatively breeding mongooses that inhabit open semi-desert areas in groups of three to 33 individuals. They forage for five to eight hours per day, typically at a distance of 20–50 m from the nearest burrow or shelter [11]. Foraging animals frequently scan their surroundings for predators (Fig. 1). Group members also alternate guarding from a raised sentinel position [12].

Guards and foraging individuals emit several different alarm calls when they spot a predator.

Acoustic analysis

Of the calls recorded, 254 were of sufficiently high quality to permit acoustic analysis. To control for individual variation, calls were drawn from at least six different subjects for each call type (the average number of subjects was 12, and the maximum was 15). Only one call per individual and predator encounter was used in analysis. Canary software [14], Signal software (Engineering Design, Belmont, MA, USA), and LMA software [15] were used to measure 28 different acoustic parameters that

Call responses

In the field, suricates were played alarm calls in the absence of actual predators and their responses were filmed. Playback of alarm calls given to different predators elicited significantly different responses, duplicating behavior seen under natural conditions. In response to playback of mammalian predator alarm calls, subjects moved rapidly in the direction of the loudspeaker while scanning the area. They typically gathered together 5–10 m away from the loudspeaker and then retreated toward

Motivational vocalizations

Acoustically different alarm calls are believed to have evolved in species in which individuals are attacked by a variety of different predators, each of which demands a different escape strategy 17, 18. Because suricates are preyed upon by species with different hunting techniques, selection may have favored an alarm call repertoire that encodes information about predator type in addition to level of urgency. By contrast, many ground squirrels and marmots escape from all predators in the same

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How do primates learn to communicate? An influential, but largely untested model proposes that primates go through a pruning process, guided by social learning, during which they increasingly restrict alarm calling from initially broad ranges of animals to a few dangerous predators. To test this model, we conducted an experiment with free-ranging sooty mangabeys, Cercocebus atys atys, in which we systematically exposed different age groups to models of dangerous vipers and nonvenomous colubrid snakes. We found that young juveniles perceived all snakes as dangerous and indiscriminately alarm called, although they had the longest response latencies. In contrast, adults showed antipredator behaviours faster to vipers than colubrids but never alarm called to the latter, unlike juveniles. Finally, all young and some older juveniles alternated their gaze between the snake models and other group members, suggesting they engaged in social referencing, that is, gazing at others to assess their reactions to external events. Our study provides a systematic, empirical demonstration that, in nonhuman primates, predator learning starts with overgeneralization, followed by subsequent refinement via social learning during the juvenile phase.
Meerkat manners: Endocrine mediation of female dominance and reproductive control in a cooperative breeder
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To gain more balanced understanding of sexual selection and mammalian sexual differentiation processes, this review addresses behavioral sex differences and hormonal mediators of intrasexual competition in the meerkat (Suricata suricatta) – a cooperative breeder unusual among vertebrates in its female aggression, degree of reproductive skew, and phenotypic divergence. Focused on the evolution, function, mechanism, and development of female dominance, the male remains a key reference point throughout. Integrated review of endocrine function does not support routine physiological suppression in subordinates of either sex, but instead a ramp up of weight, reproduction, aggression, and sex steroids, particularly androgens, in dominant females. Important and timely questions about female competition are thus addressed by shifting emphasis from mediators of reproductive suppression to mediators of reproductive control, and from organizational and activational roles of androgens in males to their roles in females. Unusually, we ask not only how inequity is maintained, but how dominance is acquired within a lifetime and across generations. Antiandrogens administered in the field to males and pregnant dominant females confirm the importance of androgen-mediated food competition. Moreover, effects of maternal endocrine milieu on offspring development reveal a heritable, androgenic route to female aggression, likely promoting reproductive priority along dominant matrilines. Integrating endocrine measures with long-term behavioral, ecological, morphological, and life-history data on normative and experimental individuals, across life stages and generations, provides better appreciation of the role of naturally circulating androgens in regulating the female phenotype, and sheds new light on the evolution of female dominance, reproductive inequity, and cooperative breeding.
The acoustic behavior of the Brazilian caatinga big rodent is incongruent to its actual position in Hydrochoerinae
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Our knowledge about the acoustic behavior of Caviinae species drove us to investigate Kerodon rupestris’s (Caviidae: Hydrochoerinae) repertoire. This species is endemic to Caatinga and states as vulnerable in the Brazilian list of endangered species. We recorded sounds uttered by individuals from Santa Luzia, State of Paraíba, Brazil. We promoted interactions among 13 animals during intra and intersexual pairing sessions, under undisturbed interactions in captivity, and in free-living conditions. We found a repertoire of 13 call types, most of them (all except three) shared with Cavia and only five possibly shared also with Hydrochoerus: (1) Close contact and cohesion: tonal and noisy contact calls, tweet, slow-whistle; (2) Social regulation (incitement, subordination or auto-defense): whine, peepy-squeak, yelp; (3) Offensive aggression and status display: roar, snort, and teeth-chattering (4) Warning or intimidation: alarm-whistle, drrr, and drumming; (5) Courtship: purr and slow-whistle. The similarity of Kerodon signals to Hydrochoerinae species, despite the ecological differences, needs to be understood in comparative phylogenetic studies tracing back the origin of the courtship display in Caviidae. Thus, future research should focus on playback studies to test signals' biological function hypothesis.
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Citation Excerpt :
Alarm calls in social species provide group members with information about potential threats and give animals an opportunity to respond appropriately in advance of having detected these for themselves (Lönnstedt, McCormick, Meekan, Ferrari, & Chivers, 2012; Manser, Seyfarth, & Cheney, 2002).
Playback of audio recordings is a well-established method of eliciting behavioural responses in the wild. The effects of audio playback on the behaviour of wild European herring gulls (Larus argentatus) has not been well researched however. The present study was conducted in order to address this using playback of recordings of European herring gull alarm calls, European herring gull food begging calls, a woodland dawn chorus or silence to wild free-living birds that had been attracted to the study site by the scattering of a highly palatable food mixture. Each call type was played 8–9 times in randomised order across the 40 day study period with only one call being played per day. Playback was initiated 30 s after two or more gulls had landed within the within the baited area and continued for 2 min thereafter. The number of birds on the ground within this area was recorded at 10 s intervals during the 30 s before the playing of the calls was initiated through to the 30 s afterwards. Results were clear and showed that whilst groups of herring gulls typically arrived in close temporal proximity to each other and quickly began consuming the food, they took flight within seconds of hearing their own species’ alarm calls even though there was still food left to be eaten. The woodland dawn chorus produced a similar effect for reasons that are not fully understood. The begging calls were largely without effect and as with the ‘silent’ condition numbers of gulls on the ground appeared to decrease in relation to a reducing amount of food left to be eaten. These data together demonstrate that whilst wild European herring gulls respond with flight upon hearing their own species’ alarm calls, other sounds can produce this effect also.
Effect of group size and experience on the ontogeny of sentinel calling behaviour in meerkats
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Increased vulnerability to predation results in young individuals of many species experiencing higher predation pressure than adults. Consequently, the production of antipredator-related calls by young can differ from that of the same vocalizations given by adults. Sentinel behaviour is a coordinated vigilance behaviour, where one individual climbs on an elevated position and scans the surroundings for predators, while the rest of the group is mainly foraging. Meerkat, Suricata suricatta, sentinels produce six distinct sentinel call types, which inform other group members about the perceived predation risk, resulting in the adjustment of personal vigilance behaviour in foraging group members. Here, we investigated the onset of sentinel behaviour and the ontogeny of the different sentinel call types as well as the development of individual vocal signatures in meerkats. We found that meerkats started acting as a sentinel around 200 days of age, but this was highly dependent on group size, with individuals from smaller groups exhibiting sentinel behaviour earlier than individuals from larger groups. All six sentinel call types were already present in the repertoire upon first emergence of the behaviour; however, call rates of ‘all-clear’ calls increased while ‘warning’ calls decreased with increasing experience as sentinel. Analysis of one of the most frequent sentinel calls, the double note calls, indicated that fundamental frequency, mean amplitude, duration and entropy differed consistently between individuals, but we found no effect of age. Rather, our results provide evidence that individual signatures in this call type were already developed when young meerkats first started to act as sentinel and changed little with age. To conclude, we showed little ontogenetic change in overall sentinel behaviour as well as in its vocal coordination, indicating potentially high selection pressures on antipredator behaviours, such as the sentinel system, resulting in consistent behavioural responses upon first emergence.
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Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Abstract

Section snippets

Preditor-specific alarm calls

Acoustic analysis

Call responses

Motivational vocalizations

References (21)

The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex (Reprinted 1981)

Monkey responses to three different alarm calls: evidence for predator classification and semantic communication

Science

Conceptual semantics in a nonhuman primate

J. Comp. Psychol.

The information that receivers extract from alarm calls in suricates

Proc. R. Soc. London B Biol. Sci.

Semantics of an avian alarm call system: the male domestic fowl, Gallus domesticus

Behaviour

What is communicated in the antipredator calls of lemurs: evidence from antipredator call playbacks to ringtailed and ruffed lemurs

Ethology

Local variation in Barbary macaque shrill barks

Anim. Behav.

On the origin of speech from animal sounds

Vocal correlates of emotion

Animal signals: motivational, referential, or both?

Cited by (190)

Acquisition of predator knowledge in sooty mangabeys

Meerkat manners: Endocrine mediation of female dominance and reproductive control in a cooperative breeder

The acoustic behavior of the Brazilian caatinga big rodent is incongruent to its actual position in Hydrochoerinae

Effects of alarm call playback on the behaviour of wild European herring gulls

Effect of group size and experience on the ontogeny of sentinel calling behaviour in meerkats

Mindshaping and Non-Gricean Approaches to Language Evolution

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Research updateSuricate alarm calls signal predator class and urgency

Abstract

Section snippets

Preditor-specific alarm calls

Acoustic analysis

Call responses

Motivational vocalizations

Science

J. Comp. Psychol.

Proc. R. Soc. London B Biol. Sci.

Semantics of an avian alarm call system: the male domestic fowl, Gallus domesticus

Behaviour

What is communicated in the antipredator calls of lemurs: evidence from antipredator call playbacks to ringtailed and ruffed lemurs

Ethology

Local variation in Barbary macaque shrill barks

Anim. Behav.

On the origin of speech from animal sounds

Vocal correlates of emotion

Animal signals: motivational, referential, or both?

Research update
Suricate alarm calls signal predator class and urgency