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The Sex Attractant Pheromone of Male Brown Rats: Identification and Field Experiment
Author(s) -
Takács Stephen,
Gries Regine,
Zhai Huimin,
Gries Gerhard
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
angewandte chemie
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1521-3757
pISSN - 0044-8249
DOI - 10.1002/ange.201511864
Subject(s) - sex pheromone , pheromone , odor , juvenile , adult male , zoology , attraction , biology , chemistry , ecology , endocrinology , neuroscience , linguistics , philosophy
Trapping brown rats is challenging because they avoid newly placed traps in their habitat. Herein, we report the identification of the sex pheromone produced by male brown rats and its effect on trap captures of wild female brown rats. Collecting urine‐ and feces‐soiled bedding material of laboratory‐kept rats and comparing the soiled‐bedding odorants of juvenile and adult males, as well as of adult males and females, we found nine compounds that were specific to, or most prevalent in, the odor profiles of sexually mature adult males. When we added a synthetic blend of six of these compounds (2‐heptanone, 4‐heptanone, 3‐ethyl‐2‐heptanone, 2‐octanone, 2‐nonanone, 4‐nonanone) to one of two paired food‐baited trap boxes, these boxes attracted significantly more laboratory‐strain female rats in laboratory experiments, and captured ten times more wild female rats in a field experiment than the corresponding control boxes. Our data show that the pheromone facilitates captures of wild female brown rats.