Coordinated behavior of killer whales, <i>Orcinus orca</i>, hunting a crabeater seal, <i>Lobodon carcinophagus</i>

Smith, Thomas G.; Siniff, Donald B.; Reichle, Richard Arnold; Stone, Sheridan

doi:10.1139/z81-167

Cited by 66 publications

(35 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…Because we had data on FG only in his prime (21-25 and 26-30 years old), it remains possible that his hunting rates had increased with age. AO's hunting proclivity developed in his prime-he hunted more than average between ages 21 and 35, but not as a younger male (ages [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. Thus, some males (FR, possibly AJ) were impact hunters for their whole adult lives, while others (AO, MS and possibly FG) varied in their hunting tendencies over time.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We use 'cooperation' to describe cases in which at least two individuals act together in a way that increases their individual fitness relative to acting alone ( joint action for mutual benefit [5,6]). Cooperative hunting occurs in several taxa, including cetaceans [7,8], social carnivores [9][10][11][12], nonhuman primates [13,14], birds [15] and humans [16]. The immediate benefits of cooperative hunting come in many forms.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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‘Impact hunters’ catalyse cooperative hunting in two wild chimpanzee communities

Gilby

Machanda

Mjungu

et al. 2015

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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One contribution of 13 to a theme issue 'Solving the puzzle of collective action through inter-individual differences: evidence from primates and humans'. Even when hunting in groups is mutually beneficial, it is unclear how communal hunts are initiated. If it is costly to be the only hunter, individuals should be reluctant to hunt unless others already are. We used 70 years of data from three communities to examine how male chimpanzees 'solve' this apparent collective action problem. The 'impact hunter' hypothesis proposes that group hunts are sometimes catalysed by certain individuals that hunt more readily than others. In two communities (Kasekela and Kanyawara), we identified a total of five males that exhibited high hunt participation rates for their age, and whose presence at an encounter with red colobus monkeys increased group hunting probability. Critically, these impact hunters were observed to hunt first more often than expected by chance. We argue that by hunting first, these males dilute prey defences and create opportunities for previously reluctant participants. This by-product mutualism can explain variation in group hunting rates within and between social groups. Hunting rates declined after the death of impact hunter FG in Kasekela and after impact hunter MS stopped hunting frequently in Kanyawara. There were no impact hunters in the third, smaller community (Mitumba), where, unlike the others, hunting probability increased with the number of females present at an encounter with prey.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘Impact hunters’ catalyse cooperative hunting in two wild chimpanzee communities

Gilby

Machanda

Mjungu

et al. 2015

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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“…They are characterized by stable social groups, populationspecific foraging strategies and vocal repertoires that are likely to be transmitted through learning. Their feeding behaviors include hunting fishes, cephalopods, sea turtles, sea birds, mustelids, pinnipeds and cetaceans (e.g., Martinez & Klinghammer, 1970;Christensen, 1978;Smith et al, 1981;Hoelzel, 1991;Jefferson et al, 1991;Baird et al, 1992;Similä & Ugarte, 1993;Matkin & Saulitis, 1994;Baird & Dill, 1995;Baird & Dill, 1996;Fertl et al, 1996;Similä et al, 1996;Ford et al, 1998;Baird & Whitehead, 2000;Ford & Ellis, 2006;Simon et al, 2006). The diversity of hunting strategies parallels the diversity of prey on which they feed.…”

Section: Killer Whales As Candidates For Using Culturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Killer whales display a striking array of population-specific feeding strategies, some of which show evidence for collective foraging and food provisioning (e.g., Smith et al, 1981;Hoelzel, 1991;Baird & Dill, 1995;Ford & Ellis, 2006). Transient killer whales in British Columbia, for example, often form groups of three animals to fetch the most amount of meat for their combined effort (Baird & Dill, 1996;Baird & Whitehead, 2000).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Orchestration : the movement and vocal behavior of free-ranging Norwegian killer whales (Orcinus orca)

Shapiro¹

2008

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Studying the social and cultural transmission of behavior among animals helps to identify patterns of interaction and information content flowing between individuals. Killer whales are likely to acquire traits culturally based on their population-specific feeding behaviors and group-distinctive vocal repertoires. I used digital tags to explore the contributions of individual Norwegian killer whales to group carousel feeding and the relationships between vocal and non-vocal activity.Periods of tail slapping to incapacitate herring during feeding were characterized by elevated movement variability, heightened vocal activity and call types containing additional orientation cues. Tail slaps produced by tagged animals were identified using a rapid pitch change and occurred primarily within 20m of the surface. Two simultaneously tagged animals maneuvered similarly when tail slapping within 60s of one another, indicating that the position and composition of the herring ball influenced their behavior.Two types of behavioral sequence preceding the tight circling of carousel feeding were apparent. First, the animals engaged in periods of directional swimming. They were silent in 2 of 3 instances, suggesting they may have located other foraging groups by eavesdropping. Second, tagged animals made broad horizontal loops as they dove in a manner consistent with corralling. All 4 of these occasions were accompanied by vocal activity, indicating that this and tail slapping may benefit from social communication. No significant relationship between the call types and the actual movement measurements was found.Killer whale vocalizations traditionally have been classified into discrete call types. Using human speech processing techniques, I considered that calls are alternatively comprised of shared segments that can be recombined to form the stereotyped and variable repertoire. In a classification experiment, the characterization of calls using the whole call, a set of unshared segments, or a set of shared segments yielded equivalent performance. The shared segments required less information to parse the same vocalizations, suggesting a more parsimonious system of representation.This closer examination of the movements and vocalizations of Norwegian killer 3 whales, combined with future work on ontogeny and transmission, will inform our understanding of whether and how culture plays a role in achieving population-specific behaviors in this species. 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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“…Among vertebrates, coordinated hunting is presently known with certainty in hominid primates (Boesch & Boesch, 1989;Stiner, Barkai, & Gopher, 2009), a few carnivores (Bailey et al, 2012;Creel & Creel, 1995;Eaton, 2009;Mech, 2007;Stander, 1992), cetaceans (Gazda, Connor, Edgar, & Cox, 2005;Smith, Siniff, Reichle, & Stone, 1981), two species of raptors (Bednarz, 1988;Leonardi, 1999), two species of corvids (Bowman, 2003;Yosef & Yosef, 2010), a few species of fish (Bshary, Hohner, Ait-El-Djoudi, & Fricke, 2006;Herbert-Read et al, 2016;Lönnstedt, Ferrari, & Chivers, 2014), crocodilians (Dinets, 2015), and monitor lizards (James & Fox, 2007;Pitman, 1931). As for invertebrates, coordination has never been demonstrated in any of the taxa known to hunt in groups (see Hyodo, Himuro, & Fujisaki, 2014), although coordination in post-hunt transportation of prey is known in ants (Lioni, Sauwens, Theraulaz, & Deneubourg, 2001).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Coordinated hunting by Cuban boas

Dinets¹

2017

AB&C

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-Coordinated hunting, in which individual predators relate in time and space to each other's actions, is uncommon in animals, and is often difficult to distinguish from simply hunting in non-coordinated groups, which is much more common. The author tested if Cuban boas (Chilabothrus angulifer) hunting bats in cave passages take into account other boas' positions when choosing hunting sites, and whether their choices increase hunting efficiency. Snakes arriving to the hunting area were significantly more likely to position themselves in the part of the passage where other snakes were already present, forming a "fence" across the passage and thus more effectively blocking the flight path of the prey, significantly increasing hunting efficiency. This is the first study to test for coordination between hunting reptiles, rather than assume such coordination based on perceived complexity of hunting behavior.

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Coordinated behavior of killer whales, Orcinus orca, hunting a crabeater seal, Lobodon carcinophagus

Cited by 66 publications

References 6 publications

‘Impact hunters’ catalyse cooperative hunting in two wild chimpanzee communities

‘Impact hunters’ catalyse cooperative hunting in two wild chimpanzee communities

Orchestration : the movement and vocal behavior of free-ranging Norwegian killer whales (Orcinus orca)

Coordinated hunting by Cuban boas

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