Dear all,
We are happy to announce our recent publication in Behaviour, describing the
social context of foraging behaviour in long-finned pilot whales. Observations
of the focal group,
centred around a tagged whale, were made using a new protocol allowing
quantitative sampling of
group-level behaviours. This method allowed us to solve the issues inherent to
group sampling, and
to validate the relation between visual observations of surface behaviour with
actual functional
behavioural state.
The social context of individual foraging behaviour in long-finned
pilot whales (Globicephala melas) (2014).�Fleur Visser, Patrick J.O. Miller,
Ricardo N.
Antunes, Machiel G. Oudejans, Monique L. Mackenzie, Kagari Aoki, Frans-Peter A.
Lam, Petter H.
Kvadsheim, Jef Huisman�& Peter L. Tyack. Behaviour 151:1473-1477.�
Abstract
Long-finned pilot whales
(Globicephala melas) are highly social cetaceans that live in matrilineal
groups and acquire their
prey during deep foraging dives. We tagged individual pilot whales to record
their diving
behaviour. To describe the social context of this individual behaviour, the tag
data were matched
with surface observations at the group level using a novel protocol. The
protocol comprised two
key components: a dynamic definition of the group centred around the tagged
individual, and a set
of behavioural parameters quantifying visually observable characteristics of
the group. Our
results revealed that the diving behaviour of tagged individuals was associated
with distinct
group-level behaviour at the water’s surface. During foraging, groups
broke up into smaller
and more widely spaced units with a higher degree of milling behaviour. These
data formed the
basis for a classification model, using random forest decision trees, which
accurately
distinguished between bouts of shallow diving and bouts of deep foraging dives
based on group
behaviour observed at the surface. The results also indicated that members of a
group to a large
degree synchronised the timing of their foraging periods. This was confirmed by
pairs of tagged
individuals that nearly always synchronized their diving bouts. Hence, our
study illustrates that
integration of individual-level and group-level observations can shed new light
on the social
context of the individual foraging behaviour of animals living in groups.
The pdf is available
at:�http://booksandjournals.brillonline.com/content/journals/10.1163/1568539x-00003195
or
email: [email protected]
�
All the
�best,
Fleur
�
Dr. Fleur Visser
Principal scientist
Kelp Marine Research
www.kelpmarineresearch.com
----
Post-doctoral research fellow
Behavioural Biology Group - Leiden University
http://science.leidenuniv.nl/index.php/ibl/bb
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