Download Innate Behavior

Fish/Animal Behavior
Animal Behavior
• Action or re-action to stimuli
• Happens in the brain (non-motor) and can be
manifested through muscular response, but often
involves both
• There can be a temporal component to the actual
behavior (learning, e.g. feed training)
• Short-term trigger for behavior, or effect on the
organism
• Long-term evolutionary significance/adaptation:
behavior is selected for.
• Animals behave in ways that maximize their
fitness
Genetic vs. environmental factors
• Nature/nurture? On-going debate, but tipping
towards nature
• Behaviors have phenotypic variation: studies
on problem solving
• Due in part to genetic propensity: ‘ability’ to
learn (epigenetics)
• Due in part to environmental pressures and
variability
• The two: genes and environment, work in
concert
• Innate behavior: less subject to environmental
variation. Developmentally fixed
Fixed Action Patterns
Fixed Action Patterns: stereotypical innate
behavior. The organism will carry it out
almost no matter what, even if it doesn’t
seem appropriate. These are all part of a
category of behaviors very important to
survival and/or fitness.
Fixed Action Patterns
Male three spined stickleback: attacks other
males with red bellies – attacks anything red
Three-spined stickleback
Gasterosteus aculeatus
Innate behavior
• Innate Behavior – a behavior that is hard-wired into the
nervous system of an individual.
– Salamanders & swimming
– Baby birds & flying
– Baby Turtles & returning to the ocean
• Brood parasitism (cuckoldry) is a classical example
(Cichlid/catfish)
• Ability to confront novel stimuli, learn about them and
adjust behavior is indicative of intelligence and self
awareness. Intelligence is costly: brain development,
parental investment etc.
Innate behavior
• Brood parasitism:
Haplochromis nubilus
Synodontis punctatus
Learning
• Change in behavior based on experience
– Maturation is behavior change based largely on
ability due to development (eg. Use of tool)
Learning
• Change in behavior based on experience
– Maturation is behavior change based largely on
ability due to development (eg. Use of tool)
Learning
• Change in behavior based on experience
– Maturation is a behavior change based largely on
ability due to development (ex. Use of tool)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
1DoWdHOtlrk
Use of a rock as an anvil – for breaking scallops
Halichoeres garnoti
Yellowhead wrasse
Learning
• Habituation
– Loss of responsiveness due to repetition
• Imprinting
– Learning in a critical time period (tightly correlated
with innate behavior) (salmon imprint on stream)
Learning
• Conditioning: Pavlov
– Associating a stimulus with punishment or reward
(can also be trial and error) (visual experiments)
Cognition (a mental process)
• Problem solving studies
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8631486
.stm
Bellwork: 1/10/2013
1. What is “imprinting?” Why is it so important for
the development of an organism?
2. What are some biological downsides of
intelligence?
Cognition
• Problem solving studies
• Consciousness and awareness (mirror
studies)
• The connection between nervous system
function and behavior (hormones,
fight/flight, hunger, attraction, pain)
• Spatial orientation and mapping
– Migration: genes, sun, magnetoreception/geometric pull, olfactory clues.
– The role of learning in migration
Fish Migration
• Fish migrations are usually round-trip
• Reasons for migration
– Food gathering
– Temperature adjustment
– Breeding
Timing of migrations
– Annual
– Daily
– generational
Classification of Fish Migration
•
Diadromous – Travel between sea & fresh water
– Anadromous – most of life at sea, breed in fresh water
– Catadromous – most of life in fresh water, breed at sea
Reasons for Migrations
• Take advantage of different habitats
– Feeding
– Protection
• Avoid adverse conditions
• Meet requirements for reproduction
Orientation During Migration
• Orientation to gradients of temperature,
salinity, and chemicals
• Orientation by the sun
• Orientation to geomagnetic and
geoelectric fields
Disadvantages of Migrations
• Expenditure of energy
– Most must store energy before migration
• Risk from predation
Adjustments Required Due to
Migrations
• Adjusting physiologically to new water
conditions
– Temperature
– Light
– Water chemistry
• Many migratory species are now rapidly
declining due to changes caused by man
Migration
Migration
10,000 Golden Rays migrating from Florida to Mexico
Stop for today
• Sign in for a quiz
Bellwork – 01/18/2012
• Change 10 – 25% of your water
• Scrub all algae from the inside of the
glass!
• Once you have taken the pH & the
temperature, report those points of data to
Mr. Young
• Windex the outside of your tank to clean off
any salt, smudges, and debris
Reproductive behavior
• Sexual selection
– Courtship/Dominance – hooded seal, bird
of paradise
– Female choice
– Male aggression
• Leks – a gathering of males for the purpose
of competitive mating displays.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGIQxBbYm10
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3-Q3x3j6zw&feature=related
Mating strategies
• Why are females, biologically, more important
than males?
• Human Examples:
– Mrs. Feodor Vassilyev – 27 births, 69 children (16
pairs of twins, 7 triplets, 4 quadruplets) [1707-1782]
– Ismail Ibn Sharif – 867 children (525 sons, 342
daughters) [1672-1727]
Mating strategies
• Promiscuous
• Monogamous
• Polygamous:
– Polygynous – many females (anything with an
alpha male, lions, hippos, many primates)
– polyandrous – many males (pipefish,
honeybees, blue whales)
• Certainty of paternity matters!
Kelp Greenling
Multiple paternity – broods of half brothers & sisters
Symbiosis
Hippocampus barbiganti
Pigmy seahorse
Symbiosis
Trumpetfish / herbivores
Clownfishes / Anemones
Vendellia cirrhosa (The dreaded Candiru)
Urinophilus diabolicus (leach-like)
1) What are some reasons for male aggression?
2) How is imprinting different than conditioning?
3) What is biological fitness? What is the ultimate
biological goal of an individual within a
population?
Behavioral ecology
• Animals behave in ways that maximize their fitness
– Reproductive behavior = more successful offspring
– Feeding behavior = maximum energy gain
• Research examples:
– Sparrows and cuckoldry
– Cheetahs and prey selection
– Elephant seals and polygyny
– Humpback whale songs
Feeding Behavior
• Example - Sunfish, provide predator with
prey of different sizes and different
densities, fish respond by foraging
optimally (taking the most energetically rich
prey under the appropriate conditions)