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Do yellow-bellied marmots respond to predator vocalizations?

We conducted four experiments to determine whether yellow-bellied marmots, Marmota flaviventris, discriminate among predator vocalizations, and if so, whether the recognition mechanism is learned or experience-independent. First, we broadcast to marmots the social sounds of coyotes, Canis latrans, wolves, Canis lupus, and golden eagles, Aquila chrysaetos, as well as conspecific alarm calls. Coyotes and eagles are extant predators at our study site, while wolves have been absent since the mid-1930s. In three follow-up experiments, we reversed the eagle call and presented marmots with forward and reverse calls to control for response to general properties of call structure rather than those specifically associated with eagles, we tested for novelty by comparing responses to familiar and unfamiliar birds, and we tested for the duration of predator sounds by comparing a wolf howl (that was much longer than the coyote in the first experiment) with a long coyote howl of equal duration to the original wolf. Marmots suppressed foraging and increased looking most after presentation of the conspecific alarm call and least after that of the coyote in the first experiment, with moderate responses to wolf and eagle calls. Marmots responded more to the forward eagle call than the reverse call, a finding consistent with a recognition template. Marmots did not differentiate vocalizations from the novel and familiar birds, suggesting that novelty itself did not explain our results. Furthermore, marmots did not differentiate between a wolf howl and a coyote howl of equal duration, suggesting that the duration of the vocalizations played a role in the marmots’ response. Our results show that marmots may respond to predators based solely on acoustic stimuli. The response to currently novel wolf calls suggests that they have an experience-independent ability to identify certain predators acoustically. Marmots’ response to predator vocalizations is not unexpected because 25 of 30 species in which acoustic predator discrimination has been studied have a demonstrated ability to respond selectively to cues from their predators.

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Louise Cooley was an NSF-REU fellow during this research. We thank Dan Jones for fast Ethernet, and for help trapping marmots, Esa Crumb, Louise Lochhead, Mark Luterra, Lucas Moyer-Horner, Amanda Nicodemus, Lucretia Olsen, Arpat Ozgul, David Pelletier, Weiwei Shen, Brian Smith, Tricia Stark, Ryan Trojan, Tyler Van Fleet, Thea Wang, Tina Wey, and Veronica Yovovich. Research protocols were approved by both the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory (RMBL) and by the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Animal Research Committee (No. 2001-191-03 approved on 3/8/04). Marmots were trapped under permits issued by the Colorado Division of Wildlife. Partial support for this research came from NSF-DBI-0242960 (to RMBL), the UCLA Faculty Senate Faculty Research Grants, a UCLA Assistant Professor’s Initiative grant, and the UCLA Division of Life Sciences Dean’s recruitment and retention funds (to DTB). We are extremely grateful to Peter Bednekoff and two anonymous reviewers whose comments helped us shorten the paper and improve its clarity.

1. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, 621 Young Drive South, Los Angeles, CA, 90095-1606, USA

   Daniel T. Blumstein, Jamie Winternitz & Janice C. Daniel

2. The Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, Crested Butte, CO, USA

   Louise Cooley

1. Daniel T. Blumstein
2. Louise Cooley
3. Jamie Winternitz
4. Janice C. Daniel

Correspondence to Daniel T. Blumstein.

Communicated by P. Bednekoff

Blumstein, D.T., Cooley, L., Winternitz, J. et al. Do yellow-bellied marmots respond to predator vocalizations?. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 62, 457–468 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-007-0473-4

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• Received: 26 September 2006

• Revised: 09 July 2007

• Accepted: 17 August 2007

• Published: 19 September 2007

• Issue Date: January 2008

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-007-0473-4

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