TY  - STD
AU  - Bonadonna F., Villafane M.
PY  - 2004//
TI  - Recognition of burrow’s olfactory signature         in blue petrels, Halobaena caerulea: an efficient discrimination mechanism in the dark
BT  - Animal behaviour
SP  - 893
EP  - 898
VL  - 67
N2  - Previous work has shown that blue petrels need olfaction to home. We investigated whether they also recognize an olfactory signature of their own nest. We performed T-maze experiments in which maze arms were connected with the subject bird’s burrow and with the burrow of a conspecific neighbour. Of 23 birds, 16 were able to recognize the arm leading to their own burrow. In a second experiment, we positioned the maze in front of the subject’s burrow but the maze arms were closed and did not enter the burrow. Consequently, no burrow odours could be sensed by the bird. In this case, 85% of birds (17 of 20) failed to choose, suggesting that petrels were not motivated to choose by positional cues in the absence of odourcues. We explored this idea further by performing a homing experiment whereby homing birds had to relocate an artificially displaced burrow entrance. Blue petrels homed, ignoring the natural burrow entrance and using the new artificial one. The ability to smell their own burrow allows blue petrels to return to the colony at night and to find the correct nest.
SN  - 0003-3472
L1  - http://www.cefe.cnrs.fr/ecomp/PDF/Bonadonna%20et%20al%202004%20(Anim%20Behav).pdf
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2003.08.013
N1  - exported from refbase (http://publi.ipev.fr/polar_references/show.php?record=2601), last updated on Fri, 24 Apr 2009 10:51:47 +0200
ID  - BonadonnaF.2004
ER  -