Individuality, species-specific features, and female discrimination of male southern white rhinoceros courtship calls

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F61989592%3A15310%2F22%3A73622791" target="_blank" >RIV/61989592:15310/22:73622791 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-021-01591-4" target="_blank" >https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-021-01591-4</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10071-021-01591-4" target="_blank" >10.1007/s10071-021-01591-4</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Individuality, species-specific features, and female discrimination of male southern white rhinoceros courtship calls

Original language description

Male vocalizations associated with courtship can play a key role in mate selection. They may help females obtain information about males&apos; quality and identity and/or may contain species-specific properties that help prevent interspecies breeding. Despite vocalizations being a prominent part of the courtship of white rhinos, the role that they play in white rhino breeding behaviour has not been extensively studied. Both southern (SWR) and critically endangered northern white rhino (NWR) males intensively vocalize during courtship with hic calls. We examined these calls and found that call properties differed between NWR and SWR males. In addition, we found that individual SWR males could be identified with a high degree of accuracy using their hic calls and that the signature information capacity in hic calls would allow females to individually recognize about 11 adult males living in or moving through their home-ranges, which may help with mate selection. Then, we conducted playback experiments with wild anoestrus SWR females. The females discriminated between the NWR and SWR hic calls and between the SWR hic and SWR pant calls. However, we only found differences in the latency of observed behaviours, not in their duration or in the intensity of females&apos; reaction. This might suggest that females which are not in oestrus are not highly responsive to a male&apos;s motivation (i.e., seeking contact or mating), but are more interested in assessing his dominance status or familiarity. Ultimately, our results indicate that courtship hic calls encode information which might help females choose mating partners.

Czech name

—

Czech description

—

Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

—

OECD FORD branch

10614 - Behavioral sciences biology

Project

—

Continuities

S - Specificky vyzkum na vysokych skolach

Publication year

2022

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

ANIMAL COGNITION

ISSN

1435-9448

e-ISSN

1435-9456

Volume of the periodical

25

Issue of the periodical within the volume

4

Country of publishing house

DE - GERMANY

Number of pages

14

Pages from-to

769-782

UT code for WoS article

000741240900001

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85122706886