Fork-tailed drongos use deceptive mimicked alarm calls to steal food

Flower, Tom P.

doi:10.1098/rspb.2010.1932

Cited by 112 publications

(105 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…imitating Accipiter hawks, females create the acoustic illusion that dangerous raptors are present ('crying wolf '-see also Flower, 2011;Flower et al, 2014;Igic et al, 2015), thus decreasing the attractiveness of their territories (Rechten, 1978). This intriguing hypothesis could be investigated experimentally by examining responses of females to playback of imitated predator calls.…”

Section: Mimetic Vocalizationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elaborate Mimetic Vocal Displays by Female Superb Lyrebirds

Dalziell

Welbergen

2016

Front. Ecol. Evol.

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Some of the most striking vocalizations in birds are made by males that incorporate vocal mimicry in their sexual displays. Mimetic vocalization in females is largely undescribed, but it is unclear whether this is because of a lack of selection for vocal mimicry in females, or whether the phenomenon has simply been overlooked. These issues are thrown into sharp relief in the superb lyrebird, Menura novaehollandiae, a basal oscine passerine with a lek-like mating system and female uniparental care. The spectacular mimetic song display produced by courting male lyrebirds is a textbook example of a sexually selected trait, but the vocalizations of female lyrebirds are largely unknown. Here, we provide the first analysis of the structure and context of the vocalizations of female lyrebirds. Female lyrebirds were completely silent during courtship; however, females regularly produced sophisticated vocal displays incorporating both lyrebird-specific vocalizations and imitations of sounds within their environment. The structure of female vocalizations varied significantly with context. While foraging, females mostly produced a complex lyrebird-specific song, whereas they gave lyrebird-specific alarm calls most often during nest defense. Within their vocal displays females also included a variety of mimetic vocalizations, including imitations of the calls of dangerous predators, and of alarm calls and song of harmless heterospecifics. Females gave more mimetic vocalizations during nest defense than while foraging, and the types of sounds they imitated varied between these contexts, suggesting that mimetic vocalizations have more than one function. These results are inconsistent with previous portrayals of vocalizations by female lyrebirds as rare, functionless by-products of sexual selection on males. Instead, our results support the hypotheses that complex female vocalizations play a role in nest defense and mediate female-female competition for breeding territories. In sum, this study reveals elaborate female vocal displays in a species widely depicted as an example of sexual selection for male extravagance, and thus highlights the hidden complexity of female vocalizations.

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Section: Mimetic Vocalizationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elaborate Mimetic Vocal Displays by Female Superb Lyrebirds

Dalziell

Welbergen

2016

Front. Ecol. Evol.

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“…This flexible use of behaviour includes the active falsification of signals and the withholding of specific signals 5,6 . Current evidence for tactical deception comes primarily from either anecdotal reports or captive studies across several taxa [7][8][9][10] , with rather limited empirical evidence coming from wild/freeranging populations [11][12][13] .…”

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confidence: 99%

Evidence for tactical concealment in a wild primate

et al. 2013

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Theory predicts that cheating individuals should alter their behaviour to avoid detection, yet empirical data for such 'deceptive' behaviour (and its putative consequence-punishment) is almost entirely absent from the literature. This dearth of evidence, particularly among primates, limits our understanding of the evolution of deception and punishment. Here, we quantify deception and punishment in a reproductive context in wild geladas (Theropithecus gelada). Individuals involved in extra-pair copulations (9% of observed copulations) exhibited behaviour consistent with tactical deception: they were less likely to vocalize and more likely to copulate when the cuckolded male was a sizable distance away (420 m). Further, many extra-pair copulations (B20%) elicited post-copulatory aggression-likely, punishmentfrom cuckolded males. This rare empirical evidence of both tactical concealment and retaliatory aggression offers a potential model system for examining the co-occurrence of deception and punishment in natural settings.

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“…Currawongs indeed treated the alarms as if they were themselves in danger from above (e.g. [18]). Although predators can pay attention to prey alarms [46,47] and use them to locate feeding opportunities [48], the use of alarm calls by prey to fool predators has not been shown previously.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Alarm calls can be used to deceive competitors, and such deception can entail non-mimetic or mimetic calls [16][17][18]. Several bird species produce alarm calls in the absence of danger to distract competitors and steal their food (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Crying wolf to a predator: deceptive vocal mimicry by a bird protecting young

et al. 2015

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Animals often mimic dangerous or toxic species to deter predators; however, mimicry of such species may not always be possible and mimicry of benign species seems unlikely to confer anti-predator benefits. We reveal a system in which a bird mimics the alarm calls of harmless species to fool a predator 40 times its size and protect its offspring against attack. Our experiments revealed that brown thornbills (Acanthiza pusilla) mimic a chorus of other species' aerial alarm calls, a cue of an Accipiter hawk in flight, when predators attack their nest. The absence of any flying predators in this context implies that these alarms convey deceptive information about the type of danger present. Experiments on the primary nest predators of thornbills, pied currawongs (Strepera graculina), revealed that the predators treat these alarms as if they themselves are threatened by flying hawks, either by scanning the sky for danger or fleeing, confirming a deceptive function. In turn, these distractions delay attack and provide thornbill nestlings with an opportunity to escape. This sophisticated defence strategy exploits the complex web of interactions among multiple species across several trophic levels, and in particular exploits a predator's ability to eavesdrop on and respond appropriately to heterospecific alarm calls. Our findings demonstrate that prey can fool predators by deceptively mimicking alarm calls of harmless species, suggesting that defensive mimicry could be more widespread because of indirect effects on predators within a web of eavesdropping.

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Fork-tailed drongos use deceptive mimicked alarm calls to steal food

Cited by 112 publications

References 29 publications

Elaborate Mimetic Vocal Displays by Female Superb Lyrebirds

Elaborate Mimetic Vocal Displays by Female Superb Lyrebirds

Evidence for tactical concealment in a wild primate

Crying wolf to a predator: deceptive vocal mimicry by a bird protecting young

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