Skip Navigation



Behavioral Ecology Advance Access published online on December 14, 2006
Behavioral Ecology, doi:10.1093/beheco/arl092
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow Lay Summary
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
18/2/324    most recent
arl092v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Ridley, A.
Right arrow Articles by Raihani, N.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow Articles by Ridley, A.
Right arrow Articles by Raihani, N.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2006. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Society for Behavioral Ecology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Facultative response to a kleptoparasite by the cooperatively breeding pied babbler

AR Ridley and NJ Raihani

Large Animal Research Group, Department of Zoology, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK

Address correspondence to A.R. Ridley, who is now at the Department of Science & Technology/National Research Foundation Centre of Excellence, Fitzpatrick Institute University of Cape Town, Rondebosch 7701, South Africa. E-mail: aridley{at}botzoo.uct.ac.za.


  Abstract

In many cases of interspecific kleptoparasitism, hosts develop defensive behaviors to minimize the impact of kleptoparasites. Because vigilance and defensive behaviors are often costly, selection should favor hosts that adjust the amount of investment needed to minimize losses to kleptoparasitism. However, examples of such facultative responses are rare. Here, we investigate the response of cooperatively breeding pied babblers (Turdoides bicolor) to the drongo (Dicrurus adsimilis), an avian kleptoparasite that regularly follows pied babbler groups, often giving alarm calls to alert the group to predators but also occasionally giving false alarm calls in order to steal food items. We show that pied babbler response to drongos varies markedly according to babbler group size. In small groups, where there are few individuals available to act as sentinels, babblers sentinel less when a drongo is present and respond strongly to drongo alarm calls. However, in large groups, where there are many individuals available to participate in predator vigilance, babblers sentinel more often when a drongo is present, rarely respond to drongo alarm calls, and aggressively displace drongos, with a consequent decline in the number of successful kleptoparasitism events. This behavior represent a facultative response to a kleptoparasite according to the costs versus benefits of tolerating their presence.

Key words: cooperative breeding, drongo, facultative response, kleptoparasitism, pied babbler, sentinel behavior, Turdoides bicolor.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 Proc R Soc BHome page
M. B. V. Bell, A. N. Radford, R. Rose, H. M. Wade, and A. R. Ridley
The value of constant surveillance in a risky environment
Proc R Soc B, August 22, 2009; 276(1669): 2997 - 3005.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Proc R Soc BHome page
A. N. Radford, L. I. Hollen, and M. B.V. Bell
The higher the better: sentinel height influences foraging success in a social bird
Proc R Soc B, July 7, 2009; 276(1666): 2437 - 2442.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Behav EcolHome page
A. R. Ridley and N. J. Raihani
Task partitioning increases reproductive output in a cooperative bird
Behav. Ecol., November 1, 2008; 19(6): 1136 - 1142.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Biol LettHome page
A. R Ridley, M. F Child, and M. B.V Bell
Interspecific audience effects on the alarm-calling behaviour of a kleptoparasitic bird
Biol Lett, December 22, 2007; 3(6): 589 - 591.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Biol LettHome page
N.J Raihani and A.R Ridley
Variable fledging age according to group size: trade-offs in a cooperatively breeding bird
Biol Lett, December 22, 2007; 3(6): 624 - 627.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Behav EcolHome page
A. R. Ridley and N. J. Raihani
Variable postfledging care in a cooperative bird: causes and consequences
Behav. Ecol., November 1, 2007; 18(6): 994 - 1000.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.