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Twenty‐four‐hour‐old lambs rely more on maternal behavior than on the learning of individual characteristics to discriminate between their own and an alien mother
Author(s) -
Terrazas A.,
Nowak R.,
Serafín N.,
Ferreira G.,
Lévy F.,
Poindron P.
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
developmental psychobiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.055
H-Index - 93
eISSN - 1098-2302
pISSN - 0012-1630
DOI - 10.1002/dev.10041
Subject(s) - alien , alien species , psychology , developmental psychology , biology , zoology , demography , ecology , introduced species , population , sociology , census
Lambs can discriminate their own mother from an alien dam on the first day of life, suggesting the recognition of individual physical characteristics of the mother. Alternatively, their choice may depend on behavioral differences existing between the ewes because of their maternal selectivity. To clarify this, the ability of 24‐hr‐old lambs to discriminate between their own and an alien mother, that were either intact and accept only their own lamb at nursing (i.e., selective, n = 19) or anosmic, which nurse indiscriminately alien lambs as well as their own (i.e., nonselective, n = 24), was assessed by a 5‐min, two‐choice test. With intact dams, lambs spent significantly more time next to their own mother whereas this was not so in the presence of anosmic dams. Furthermore, in the intact group, the vocal activity by their own mother differed from that by the alien dam while this was not so in anosmic ewes. We conclude that 24‐hr‐old lambs rely more on the behavior of the ewes to select their dam than on their individual physical characteristics. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 40: 408–418, 2002. Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience.wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/dev.10041