NDLI: Exploiting olfactory learning in alien rats to protect birds’ eggs

Content Provider	PubMed Central
Author	Price, Catherine J. Banks, Peter B.
Abstract	Predators must ignore unhelpful background “noise” within information-rich environments and focus on useful cues of prey activity to forage efficiently. Learning to disregard unrewarding cues should happen quickly, weakening future interest in the cue. Prey odor, which is rapidly investigated by predators, may be particularly appropriate for testing whether consistently unrewarded cues are ignored, and whether such behavior can be exploited to benefit prey. Using wild free-ranging populations of black rats, Rattus rattus, an alien predator of global concern, we tested whether the application of bird-nesting odors before the introduction of artificial nests (odor preexposure), enhanced the survival of birds eggs (prey) compared with areas where prey and nesting odors were introduced concurrently. In areas where predators had encountered prey odor before prey being available, the subsequently introduced eggs showed 62% greater survival than in areas where prey and odor were introduced together. We suggest that black rats preexposed to prey odor learned to ignore the unrewarding cue, leading to a significant improvement in prey survival that held for the 7-d monitoring period. Exploiting rapid learning that underpins foraging decisions by manipulating sensory contexts offers a nonlethal, but effective approach to reducing undesirable predatory impacts. Techniques based on olfactory preexposure may provide prey with protection during critical periods of vulnerability, such as immediately following a prey reintroduction. These results also highlight the potential benefits to species conservation to be gained from a greater understanding of the cognitive mechanisms driving alien predator behavior within ecological contexts.
Related Links	http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1210981109
Ending Page	19309
Page Count	6
Starting Page	19304
File Format	PDF
ISSN	00278424
e-ISSN	10916490
Journal	Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Issue Number	47
Volume Number	109
Language	English
Publisher	National Academy of Sciences
Publisher Date	2012-11-20
Access Restriction	Open
Rights Holder	National Academy of Sciences
Subject Keyword	General Research in Higher Education
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article
Subject	Multidisciplinary

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