The Influence of Life History Milestones and Association Networks on Crop-Raiding Behavior in Male African Elephants
The Influence of Life History Milestones and Association Networks on Crop-Raiding Behavior in Male African Elephants
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DOI：
10.1371/journal.pone.0031382
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发表时间：
2012-02-08
期刊：
影响因子：
3.7
通讯作者：
Alberts, Susan C.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Chiyo, Patrick I.;Moss, Cynthia J.;Alberts, Susan C.
影响野生动物种群学习和行为传播的因素对于理解物种对环境变化的反应和物种保护非常重要。在通过掠夺种植作物而与人类发生冲突的野生动物种群中，单个动物暴露于作物的简单模型并不能完全解释作物掠夺行为的普遍性。我们调查了生活史里程碑的影响，使用年龄和关联模式的概率是一个农作物掠夺者之间的野生自由放养的雄性非洲象;我们专注于男性，因为女性大象是不知道我们的研究人群中的作物袭击。我们研究了大象关联网络的几个特征;网络密度，社区结构和基于年龄相似性的关联，因为已知它们会影响种群中行为的传播。我们发现，年长的男性比年轻的男性更有可能成为袭击者，当他们最亲密的伙伴也是袭击者时，男性更有可能成为袭击者，当他们第二亲密的伙伴是比他们年长的袭击者时，男性更有可能成为袭击者。男性协会网络稀疏的协会，一个倾向于个人在年龄和袭击状态相关联，和一个强大的社区结构。然而，袭击者在社区之间随机分布。大象关联网络的这些特征可能限制了袭击行为的传播，并可能决定了袭击行为在大象种群中的流行程度。我们的研究结果表明，社会学习有一个主要的影响收购的袭击行为在年轻男性，而生活史因素的袭击行为在老年男性的重要驱动力。此外，生活史和网络模式都可能影响动物种群中复杂行为的获得和传播，并为管理人类与野生动物的冲突提供见解。
Factors that influence learning and the spread of behavior in wild animal populations are important for understanding species responses to changing environments and for species conservation. In populations of wildlife species that come into conflict with humans by raiding cultivated crops, simple models of exposure of individual animals to crops do not entirely explain the prevalence of crop raiding behavior. We investigated the influence of life history milestones using age and association patterns on the probability of being a crop raider among wild free ranging male African elephants; we focused on males because female elephants are not known to raid crops in our study population. We examined several features of an elephant association network; network density, community structure and association based on age similarity since they are known to influence the spread of behaviors in a population. We found that older males were more likely to be raiders than younger males, that males were more likely to be raiders when their closest associates were also raiders, and that males were more likely to be raiders when their second closest associates were raiders older than them. The male association network had sparse associations, a tendency for individuals similar in age and raiding status to associate, and a strong community structure. However, raiders were randomly distributed between communities. These features of the elephant association network may limit the spread of raiding behavior and likely determine the prevalence of raiding behavior in elephant populations. Our results suggest that social learning has a major influence on the acquisition of raiding behavior in younger males whereas life history factors are important drivers of raiding behavior in older males. Further, both life-history and network patterns may influence the acquisition and spread of complex behaviors in animal populations and provide insight on managing human-wildlife conflict.