Effect of conspecific alarm calls in the parental behaviour of nesting Southern House Wrens

CORRAL, MARÍA GABRIELA; LLAMBIAS, PAULO; FERNANDEZ, GUSTAVO J.

ACTA ETHOLOGICA

SPRINGER HEIDELBERG

Lugar: HEIDELBERG; Año: 2013 vol. 16 p. 47 - 51

0873-9749

Alarm calls are usually used to signal the presenceof a threat to members of the same species and havebeen studied broadly in social foraging species.We analysedthe effects of conspecific alarm calls on the parental behaviourof a territorial species, the southern house wrens(Troglodytes aedon musculus), during nestling stage. Wecompared the parental response of adults feeding 9?11-day-old nestlings when faced with conspecific alarm callsand with a control non-sympatric species? song broadcastfrom a neighbouring territory. We measured the time requiredby parents to return to the nest (latency) when exposedto the stimuli and estimated parent?s nest visitationrate and mean visit duration. Parents took longer to resumeparental activities when we broadcast a conspecific alarmcall, but they did not modify their nest visitation rate or themean visit duration. Heterospecific songs did not seem toaffect parental behaviour. Our results suggest that nestingsouthern house wrens can use alarm calls uttered fromneighbouring territories to assess the presence of a threatand adjust their parental behaviour accordingly.