LSM1303 Animal Behaviour

Simply looking at the smiles on their faces and how they seem to have so much fun riding on the bow waves of boats and even their carefree and playful interaction with the human swimmers definitely brightens up one’s day!

National Geographic, Photograph by Bill Curtsinger

BUT…! Despite their countless playful displays, are you aware dolphins that they are well known for being one of the most intelligent animals in the animal kingdom? Recent study finds that they even recognize themselves in mirrors—one of the very few mammals other than humans that are capable to do so! Other than that, very interestingly, researchers recently made a discovery on their odd hunting technique!

In May 2005, it was discovered that dolphins, specifically the Indo-Pacific Bottlenose Dolphin (Tursiops aduncus) actually displays cultural behavior. The dolphins were observed holding sponges, i.e. the marine sponge broken from the seabed, over their beaks. The sponges are thought to be serving as a protective glove, to prevent dolphins from getting stung by stonefish. Then they were seen using them as a fishing tool. This is in fact the first piece of evidence of a tool-use culture in marine animals.

A twist to the new found behavior! This hunting tactic was almost strictly confined to a small group of female dolphins and their daughters. In fact, only one pathetic male dolphin was found to show the same behavior. I hope at this point, you will be pondering over the same question as me now. So, is this behavior learnt or inherited?

A further study was done on whether this cultural transmission could be explained scientifically and the group of researchers finds that this sponging behavior is unlikely to be due to inheritance. Instead, they concluded that they are learnt behavior by daughters from their mothers. To explain why the male offspring do not display similar behavior would be that seabed foraging a solitary activity is not exactly suited for males where they have the tendency to form alliances with other males.

References

• “Social Behavior” Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolphin#Social_behaviour
• “Dolphin Moms Teach Daughters to Use Tools”, by James Owen. National Geographic, 07 June 2005.http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/06/0607_050607_dolphin_tools.html
• “Bottlenose Dolphin” National Geographic.http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/bottlenose-dolphin.html

Giant squid (genus: Architeuthis) is one that lives in the deep ocean. Research has suggested that they can live at an approximate 1.5kilometre down in the water.

Their physical size can grow to a size of approximately 13metres long for the females and 10metres for the males.

Giant squids have very unique  sexual behavior where the male ejaculate sperm under the skin of the female’s arms and she carries the sperm around with her until she is ready to lay her big jelly mass of a million eggs (Hoving, 2004). As we know, Females giant squid are relatively one third larger than male giant squid, hence this size differentiation makes the reproduction process difficult; especially when the female is not keen on being injected.  Male giant squid might experience detriments during the conflict.

To overcome the size barrier, male giant squid has a penis that can grow up to 8 FEET long! According to Randell “This is no ordinary eight-foot penis. It is hypodermic, and hence able to pierce the female’s arm and impregnate her”. With its length, male giant squid can remain at a fairly safe distance away from the female during injection. 

However, having such a long penis does have its drawbacks. According to a Japanese scientist: “It seems coordinating eight legs, two feeding tentacles and a huge penis, whilst fending off an irate female, is a bit too much to ask”(citation).  News has reported that a few cases of male giant squid washed up shore were found with sperm packages inseminated on its own legs and body (CDNN, 2005).

This put us to ponder, does longer really means better?

References

CDNN, (20050925). Scuba diving. Retrieved April 13, 2009, from CDNN Web site: http://www.cdnn.info/news/eco/e050925.html

Hoving, H.J.T., Roeleveld, M.A.C., Linpinski, M.R., & Melo, Y. (2004). Reproductive system of the giant squid Architeuthis in South African waters. The Zoological Society of London, 264, 153-169.

Randall, David (20051002). Environment. Retrieved April 10, 2009, from The Independent Web site: http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/love-in-the-deep-sex-life-of-the-giant-squid-revealed-509302.html

Nora, an adopted grey tabby, has won fame for playing the piano. This rare behavior was apparently self-taught or innate, when she climbed on top of a Yamaha Disklavier piano in the middle of the night and began to play. The couple who adopted Nora owns an art and music studio, where students play the piano in the day. The owners of Nora observed that she has a preference to play on the Yamaha Disklavier piano, even though there are other pianos in their studio. She also includes black keys in her music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ860P4iTaM), and plays duets with the students (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0zgQAp7EYw).

From both videos, it does seem like Nora is musically inclined and not just “fooling around” with the piano. Is her sense of music innate or is there some other reason for her bahavior? A 2001 National Geographic article “Do Animals Have an Innate Sense of Music” suggests that animals, including birds and mammals like whales use many musical concepts, such as rhythm, phrase lengths and song structure in their communication. This may help to explain Nora’s sense of rhythm when playing the piano.

However, a piano is an unnatural musical instrument for an animal. Although the owners claim that Nora is self-taught, one might think it’s more probable that Nora might have went through “observational learning”, where the owners taught students to play the piano in the day when Nora was around. Since Nora was also described as being attention loving, the huge amount of attention thrown onto her following her piano-playing incident might have served as a positive reinforcement for her to do it again.

While the rare behavior of Nora has yet been explained satisfactorily, it is most reasonable to suspect that an interplay of the cat’s innate musical abilities and subsequent learning through observation can account for the phenomenon.

References

“Do Animals Have an Innate Sense of Music?”, by Jen Mapes. National Geographic, 05 Jan 2001.

“Nora (Cat)“, Wikipedia. Date accessed: 12 Apr 2009.

female-female copulatory behavior

Intriguingly, the New Mexico Whiptail Lizard, scientifically known as Cnemidophorus Neomexicanus, is an all-female populated group of species! Don’t waste your time scouting for a male, you’ll never find one! How then do unisexual females like us engage in reproductive behavior?

Fret not! We engage in parthenogenesis, where we are able to develop our eggs without fertilization. In simpler terms, we clone ourselves! A single one of us in isolation can produce genetically identical daughters. However, what is more interesting is, when two of us encounter each other, we may engage in mutual sexual stimulation in which the hormone estrogen brings on “female” copulatory behavior patterns and progesterone brings on “male” copulatory behavior patterns in each lizard alternatively, meaning we take turns. Under this stimulation pattern each of us produces more daughters than if we reproduce in isolation. This diversity in patterns of reproduction highlights the flexibility of animal behavior. Paradigms such as ecofeminism and Gaia theory focus on cooperation being the equal of competition as the driving force in the evolution of species (Rabin, 2005).

Ecofeminism is based on the notion that life on Earth is preserved by means of cooperation, and mutual care and love. Gaia theory states that evolution does not arise only by competition for resources among members of a species but by cooperation too. Behavioral flexibility such as same-sex intimacy is a survival advantage. These paradigms point to a common idea that cooperation within species is important for our own survival.

So strike off the orthodox view that male-female copulation is always necessary for reproduction! Cooperation between one another can aid our reproductive behavior and fecundity. The diversity and beauty of nature have allowed this behavior to occur! So, who says we need a man?

References:
Rabin, Joan. S. 2005. “Biological Exuberance, Gaia Theory, and Ecopsychology: New Scientific Theories of Nature as a Model of Diversity and Creativity”. Proceedings of the Eleventh Towson University Multicultural Conference 2005.
(From Google Scholar)

George, Dias Brian and David Crews. 2006. “Serotonergic modulation of male-like pseudocopulatory behavior in the parthenogenetic whiptail lizard, Cnemidophorus uniparens”. Hormones and Behavior, 50(3): 401-409.
(From NUS libproxy)

Photo courtesy of: http://www.flickr.com/photos/9758352@N07/1943263162/

What you are seeing now is no illusion. The lioness (Felidae Panthera leo) is walking normally with what would usually be her meal of the day: a little cute oryx (Oryx gazella). This would be considered a travesty in the conventional predator and prey relationship; the hunter becomes a surrogate parent for its prey.

Even more astonishing facts have followed this most unusual bonding in nature. The lioness, also affectionately known as Kamunyak by the locals, have been taking care of this oryx for a period of 16 days, ignoring her predatory instincts and instead showering the baby antelope with her maternal care and attention. The lioness basically took the young oryx under her charge and regarded it as if it was her own, even to the extent of protecting it from her own species who have predatory intentions on the baby antelope.

As to the reason why the lioness did such a strange thing, there has not been a clear rationale or explanation. The theory of Cost-benefit analysis used to study animal behaviour also did not reveal any feasible benefits that the lioness could derive from taking care of the oryx. In fact, according to the article at Animal Discovery, the costs of taking care of the oryx seem to have taken a toll in the lioness’s health:

“Kamunyak refuses to leave her young charge, so she’s not feeding herself and is woefully undernourished. In an effort to help the park warden throws her a chunk of meat but Kamunyak refuses to eat it. As the days go on she becomes less and less able to protect herself or the oryx from other lions.”

This is really an intriguing finding in the marvelous world of Mother Nature. It is the first time that I ever heard of a predator-prey relationship being changed in such a manner. Is the maternal instinct of the lioness so strong that it could overshadow her predatory instincts? Or is it an unknown factor that is at work behind the scenes. For more information please visit the websites found on the reference list.

References:

Heart of a Lioness by Saba Douglas Hamilton. Animal Discovery website

http://animal.discovery.com/fansites/wildkingdom/lioness/about/about.html

October 30^th, 2007

http://animal.discovery.com/fansites/wildkingdom/lioness/expert/expert12.html

(An extra link to let you people gather more information about the story.)

Scientific Paper/ Book:

George B. Schaller. (1972). Chapter 8 The Hunt pages 233 to 235. The Serengeti Lion. Retrieved April 8^th, 2009 from

http://books.google.com.sg/books?id=a0u2XJ9gEcEC&dq=Lions+prey&lr=&source=gbs_summary_s&cad=0