Individual signatures in scent gland secretions of Eurasian deer

Abstract

Evidence for individuality of odour pro®le, coding for individual identity, was sought in scent pro®les derived from natural secretions of the preorbital gland of red deer Cervus elaphus (n = 26), sika deer C. nippon (15), fallow deer Dama dama (50), Chinese muntjac Muntiacus reevesi (23) and Chinese water deer Hydropotes inermis (53); from metatarsal secretions from red deer (n = 35), sika (30), fallow (193) and roe deer Capreolus capreolus (26), and from roe deer interdigital glands (n = 48). Volatiles were eluted from sample materials at body temperature, to restrict analysis to those elements that would occur within the natural odour signal; the different volatile elements were then separated by gas chromatography. For each species considered, secretions from at least one scent gland were individually distinct and suf®ciently complex to code for identity. Within our samples no two individuals produced identical odour pro®les; yet in analysis of metatarsal gland secretions of individual fallow deer sampled in successive years, odour signatures of individuals remained consistent over time. The wider potential for individual coding was assessed through calculation of the number of different possible combinations of all volatiles recovered in any species6gland system. Every secretion considered seems to have the potential to provide individually characteristic signals (with the exception of secretions from the fallow deer preorbital gland, which notably contained no odour information under any analytical system). Complexity of signals differed markedly between species as did the gland-type responsible for production of the most complex or distinctive signal. No simple evolutionary patterns are apparent to account for this variation and we suggest that the form of gland selected for production of a signal carrying information about individual identity is a function of habitat type and sociality.

Chemical communication in Eurasian deer (Cervidae): do individual odours also code for attributes?

“…Absolute peak areas could not be used in analysis, since samples from different individuals may have differed in size and volatility, and the total amounts of material eluted in preliminary extraction onto tenax may have varied between samples. Analyses were therefore carried out on transformed data, with each peak area expressed as a proportion of the total area of the entire pro®le for that individual (as Lawson et al, 2000).…”

“…Scent gland secretions for all species were sampled as follows (see also Lawson et al, 2000): Preorbital glands (fallow, red, sika, muntjac, Chinese water deer). A sterile metal spatula was inserted into the preorbital pocket to remove the wax plug (fallow and red deer) or creamy liquid (other species) which was then transferred immediately to a 2-ml glass vial.…”

“…In a companion paper, Lawson, Putman & Fielding (2000) demonstrate that scent secretions produced by different species of Eurasian deer contain suf®cient information to act as individually characteristic signatures of identity; in this paper we explore whether these same odours, or secretions produced by other glands on the body, may also offer speci®c information about attributes such as age, sex or genetic lineage.…”

Sexual and individual cues in the peri-anal gland secretum of crested porcupines (Hystrix cristata)

“…Tang Halpin 1986; Lawson et al 2000;Buesching et al 2002aBuesching et al , 2002bHagey and Macdonald 2003;Zhang et al 2003;Macdonald et al 2008). Such a role has been suggested also for the perineal glands in Cavia porcellus (Wellington et al 1979 in Albone and Shirley 1984;Beuchamp 1974 in Albone andShirley 1984).…”

First records of preorbital gland opening in rare wild barasingha (Rucervus duvaucelii) in social contexts may help to explain this phenomenon in cervids

“…and Northern pudu (Pudu mephistophiles; Groves and Grubb, 1987). Besides scent-marking (Lawson et al, 2000), the opening of this gland clearly also serves as a visual communication (recently discussed in Ceacero et al, 2014), which has been linked to different behavioural situations such as agonistic interactions (Bartoš, 1983;MacNamara and Eldridge, 1987), maternal behaviour (Bartošová et al, 2012;Ceacero et al, 2014), alert behaviour (MacNamara and Eldridge, 1987), and sexual behaviour (Bartoš, 1983 for a review see Ceacero et al, 2015). Most of these reports involved long-term investigations of just the one model species: red deer Cervus elaphus.…”