Social systems of mammals are discussed in the slides....

1. HANNAN ABDUL KAHLIQ
ZMPI 16-04
PUNJAB UNIVERSITY
ZOOLOGY DEPARTMENT
SUBJECT: ADVANCED MAMMALOGY

3. Social Behavior
Social:
Being social means that you have relationship with
society or its organization.
Behavior:
The way in which an animal behaves in response to
a particular situation or stimulus that comes from
the environment.

4. Social Behavior of Mammals
• Social Behavior of mammals mainly
comprises of Social Systems
– A social system is the patterned series of
interrelationships existing between
individuals, groups and forming a whole.
– Mammals have several orders and every order
has its specific social system showing the
diversity of social behavior.

6. • Few families in metatherians developed the
social behavior.
–Petauridae:
• Petaurus breviceps, the honey glider, developed best in this
family.
• Cohesive groups are dominated, protected and run by males.
–Macropedidae:
• Developed to varying degrees.
• Highly developed is Macropus parryi, the whiptail wallaby.
• In whiptail, the population is called mobs.
• Occupy a home range but not properly defended.
• Social system is poor, but they are dominated by male
hierarchy which is developed by ritualized fighting.
• In estrus, female is protected by a dominant male with
exclusive mating rights.

7. • Vombatidae:
• Unusual behavior
• Males develop burrows, are philopatric (returning to a same
place).
• Share their burrows with their kin.
• Females disperse and less likely to associate with other
females.

8. Chiroptera

9. • Sexual Behavior:
– Females are so large in number that they are not defensible.
Due to same reason male bats have to be polygynous.
– Few species are solitary except for mating
– In some families, both sexes separate from each other when
the pups are born.
– Females form nursery of kids.
– After pups mature, sexes reunite.
– In buffy flower bat, multi-male multi-female system exists
– Their system is mainly lek based.
• Roosting Behavior:
• Round eared bats create their own roosts and are called
camping bats.
• Others excavate the termite nets and attract the females.

10. Rodentia

11. • A bit advanced than the previous ones.
• Social behavior is influenced by:
– Daily and seasonal activity
– Distribution of food
– Environmental constraints
– Predation
• Black Tailed Prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus):
• Highly social, social units are called Coteris.
• Coterie: Composed of one adult male, several females and young ones.
• Without dominant hierarchy.
• Everything inside the premises of coterie are shared by all members.
• Hostility with neighbors always exist.
• Two syllable call used to claim the territorial ownership.
• They become familiar to each other, and to recognize a member of same
territory, they have developed a Kissing behavior.
• Advantages of coterie: Watching out for danger, many voices for
alarm, low vegetation due to continuous foraging, long term occupancy
of area.

13. • Family Lemuridae:
– Mouse lemurs have a special social unit of “population nuclei”,
dominated by 3-4 males and several females are also there.
– Though they are a social pack but they forage alone and cannot be
regarded as the best one.
– Ring tailed lemur is more advanced. Their social unit is called a
troop.
– Troop contains females and males in equal numbers.
– Dominated by females, male hierarchy exists but dominant male does
not have access to females every time.
– Little intertroop contact.
• Baboon family:
• In families like baboon, the dominant leader male is focal point and all
group is geared by him.
• Female status depends upon associated male and his aggressive
behavior.
• If he fails in confrontations, her status declines.
• Baboons living in savanna are more vulnerable as food is scattered and
individuals searching far areas are easily accessible to predators.

14. • Males are different than females as they contain huge canines, larger in size
and strong body.
• Mating patterns involve the interference of dominant males as only
dominant ones are allowed to mate with the female in her peak time.
• Chimpanzees (P. troglodytes):
– Basic group basically consist of 30-80 members, which is loose and can
dissociate into parties
– Highly specialized voice signals for food or as alarms for whole social
group.
– Hunt in groups and are opportunistic.
– Not very gentle and males seem to kill the males of other groups.

16. • Very few carnivores have evolved social behavior.
• Coyote is social but only opportunistically.
• In abundance of food they form packs, but when the food is rare they are
Solitary.
• Small diurnal procoyonids are social, their unit is called bands.
• A band consists of 30 females and scattered males.
• Some females in the band are very aggressive as they are not related to
others, but they remain in the pack because leaving the pack will be more
vulnerable.
• Mongoose are diurnal and highly social, especially dwarf mongoose.
• Consists approximately on 8 individuals, dominant “alpha” family (most
aged), an additional male two females (helpers) and some juveniles.
• Leader is usually the female and they sleep feed and live together.
• Alarms calls and contact calls are used abundantly.
• Helpers do most of the foraging and baby sitting etc.
• Canis lupus are highly socialized, dominance hierarchy exists and they can
kill large prey in groups.

17. • Hyena has a basic social unit known as clan, consisting of 80 animals.
• Disrupted by large migrations of wild beasts and Zebra, resulting in drastic
food shift.
• During food shift, clans evacuate their territory and commute to migrating
herds. Many of them especially females die during this movement.
• Territory is marked by scent and defended, fightings are violent and
individuals are murdered.
• Females are larger than males and are dominant due to strong bonding.
• When dominant female killed, others tend to replace her by competing each
other “who eats food fastly” rather than showing the power.
• In spotted hyena, there are three classes of a group namely females, cubs
and three male classes.
• Males sometime remain into their natal group or leave the group and join
other, these time of males have low reputition in previous clan.
• When two different hyenas meet, they recognize each other with the help of
familiar genitalia.

18. • Lions have a fairly stable social unit called pride, consisting of 3-12 adult
females and one or more adult males. (no outside females)
• At age of 3, female may be accepted as member or forced to quit the pride.
• Pride is driven by several adult males who defend it and make it peaceful
and stable group, and members are affectionate.
• Opportunistically they may hunt alone but mostly in groups.
• Males do not continuously remain in the group because group basically
consists of their grandmothers sisters and brothers.
• Males leave the pride mostly in groups as they may be brothers.
• The leaving group tries to take over another pride, in group they often
succeed.
• After taking over, they disturb the estrus cycle of females, occasionally kill
their kids and start over their reproductive cycle after which they protect &
take care of them.
• All the females of the pride take care of the new born and a cub can be
lactated by other females.
• Males fight to mate with female
• Size of the pride is controlled by food shortage, life span is long.

19. E l e p h a n t s

20. • Several levels of social system
– FAMILY
– KIN
– BACHERLOR HERD
• Family consists of grandmothers, daughters, sons, grandsons and grand
daughters. Mostly 10-20 members are there.
• Females bond socially for nearly 50 years
• Kinship involves several family groups living in same vicinity, occasion and
mingle peaceably. They are not together except during the migration times.
• At their maturity, bulls leave their family and join Bachelor herds, all
male herd.
• It is dominated by ritual dominance , and dominant male gets a female in
estrus.

21. Ungulates

22. • Bovids are most widely studies and occupy open grasslands as the food
supply is abundant.
• Blue duikers are small, forest dwelling, African antelops.
• Form monogamous pairs and defend small territory ranging 3-4 hectares in
size and marked by scents.
• Pair bonds are recognized by social licking and mutual pressing of
preorbital glands.
• Impala: dominant males maintain the boundaries of the herds.
• Territories have specific area each protected and ruled by dominated males.
• If a female enters in the herd accidentally, dominant male does not let her
go.
• Dominant male always faces the rival males coming from outside, he
continuously keeps a check on estrus and bachelor female, keeping other
males away from them.
• African buffalos: Mainly comprise 50-2000 animals and constant amount
is 350.
• For two years, young male stays closer to her mother, after that they leave
their mother and form subgroups within a group.
• Linear dominance hierarchy exists between them as a result of sparing.
• Males of more than 10 years leave the herd and become extremely sedentary.
• Most dominating males have highest approach towards estrus females.

23. Any Questions