Male African elephants, Loxodonta africana, can distinguish oestrous status via urinary signals

Bagley, Kathryn R.; Goodwin, Thomas E.; Rasmussen, L.E.L.; Schulte, Bruce A.

doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2006.01.003

Cited by 45 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…African elephant musth urine trails evoke strong inspection by conspecifics (Poole, 1987), consistent with reports that vertebrate urine includes chemical signals (Albone, 1984). Male African elephants can differentiate between the urine of female conspecifics in the luteal and follicular phases of estrus (Bagley et al, 2006) and between urine from musth and non-musth males (Hollister-Smith et al, 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Chemical Signals of Elephant Musth: Temporal Aspects of Microbially-Mediated Modifications

et al. 2012

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Mature male African (Loxodonta africana) and Asian (Elephas maximus) elephants exhibit periodic episodes of musth, a state in which serum androgens are elevated, food intake typically decreases, aggressiveness often increases, and breeding success is enhanced. Urine is a common source of chemical signals in a variety of mammals. Elephants in musth dribble urine almost continuously for lengthy periods, suggesting that the chemicals in their urine may reveal their physiological condition to conspecifics. We investigated the volatile urinary chemicals in captive male elephants using automated solid phase dynamic extraction (SPDE) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). We found higher levels of alkan-2-ones, alkan-2-ols, and some aromatic compounds in urine from males in musth than in urine from non-musth males or from females. Levels of ketones and alcohols increased as the urine aged, likely due to microbial metabolism of fatty acids. Protein-derived aromatic metabolites also increased in abundance after urination, likely due to microbial hydrolysis of hydrophilic conjugates. We suggest that microbes may play an important role in timed release of urinary semiochemicals during elephant musth.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Chemical Signals of Elephant Musth: Temporal Aspects of Microbially-Mediated Modifications

et al. 2012

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“…Within mammals, urine commonly includes odour cues to individual identity (Halpin 1986) and is known to allow elephants to judge the reproductive states of both males and females (Poole et al 1984;Bagley et al 2006). To test whether elephants monitored individuals' locations, we used an expectancy-violation paradigm, moving urine from its place of deposit to a location where a moving group would pass over it and recording the reaction.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

African elephants have expectations about the locations of out-of-sight family members

et al. 2007

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Monitoring the location of conspecifics may be important to social mammals. Here, we use an expectancy-violation paradigm to test the ability of African elephants ( Loxodonta africana ) to keep track of their social companions from olfactory cues. We presented elephants with samples of earth mixed with urine from female conspecifics that were either kin or unrelated to them, and either unexpected or highly predictable at that location. From behavioural measurements of the elephants' reactions, we show that African elephants can recognize up to 17 females and possibly up to 30 family members from cues present in the urine–earth mix, and that they keep track of the location of these individuals in relation to themselves.

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“…Urine scent contains cues conveying information on individual identity, social status, gender and reproductive status in many mammal species [23], [32], [33], [34], and urine contains different chemical compounds present at different ratios, so that it is ideal for coding individuality in mammals and birds [31], [32], [35]. The urine odor is also covariant with genes in Mus species [14].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Low Incidence of Miscarriage Induced by the Scent of Male Littermates of Original Mates: Male Kinship Reduces the Bruce Effect in Female Mice, Mus musculus

Wang

Liu

2013

PLoS ONE

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The scent of a novel male can elicit pregnancy block in recently mated female mice (Mus musculus), a phenomenon known as the Bruce effect. Despite abundant literature on the Bruce effect in rodents, it remains unclear whether males related to a female’s original mate can induce the Bruce effect in out-bred, communally living mice. We investigated this question using Kunming (KM) male mice of varying genetic relatedness. Recently mated females were subjected to three treatments: exposure to the urine of the mate, urine of the mate’s male littermate, and urine of a male unrelated to the mate. It was found that the urine of male littermates of the females’ mates did not elicit more pregnancy block than that of the females’ mates. However, the urine of novel males caused a higher rate of female miscarriage than that of the females’ mates. By using a habituation-dishabituation paradigm, we found that unmated females could discriminate the urine scents of two male littermates from those of a novel male unrelated to the littermates. To understand how females use urinary cues to discriminate between males with different genetic relationships, we used gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS) to examine the volatile composition of urine from males with varying relatedness. It was found that KM male littermates shared similar volatile compositions in their urine. Our results suggest that male kinship reduces the Bruce effect in female KM mice, and provide additional evidence for mate choice being partly mediated by the Bruce effect in KM mice.

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Male African elephants, Loxodonta africana, can distinguish oestrous status via urinary signals

Cited by 45 publications

References 26 publications

Chemical Signals of Elephant Musth: Temporal Aspects of Microbially-Mediated Modifications

Chemical Signals of Elephant Musth: Temporal Aspects of Microbially-Mediated Modifications

African elephants have expectations about the locations of out-of-sight family members

Low Incidence of Miscarriage Induced by the Scent of Male Littermates of Original Mates: Male Kinship Reduces the Bruce Effect in Female Mice, Mus musculus

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