Washington – The dogs of the meadow are the Paul reveals of the great plains: they bark to alert the residents of the presence of predators, with separate calls for the dangers that arrive by land or by air.
“The dogs of the meadow are in the menu of almost all the predators who can imagine: real eagles, red tail hawks, foxes, weighs, even great snakes”Said Andy Boyce, a researcher ecologist in Montana at the National Institute of Zoology and Biology of Smithsonian conservation.
These predators will also feed on birds that nest in grasslands such as the long peak zarapito.
To protect themselves, the zarapitos listen to the alarms from the dog colonies of the meadow, according to an investigation published Thursday in the animal magazine Behavior.
Previous investigations have shown that birds often listen to other bird species to obtain information on possible food sources or hazards that are approaching, said the ornithologist of the University of Georgetown, Emily Williams, who did not participate in the study. But, until now, scientists have documented only some cases of birds that listen to mammals.
“That does not necessarily mean that it is weird in nature,” he said, “it just means that we have not yet studied it.”
The dogs of the meadow live in large colonies with a series of burrows that can spread by kilometers underground. When the barking of others are heard, they remain alert observing or immerse themselves in their burrows to avoid the doors that are approaching.
“Those little barking are very strong, they can go very far,” said co -author Andrew Dreelin, who also works for Smithsonian.
The long -tidy peak zarapito in short grass grasslands and incuba the eggs in a nest in the ground. When one listens to the dog’s dog alarm, he responds by pressing the head, peak and belly near the ground.
In this crouched position, the birds “trust the incredible camouflage of their feathers to become essentially invisible in the plains,” said Dreelin.
To try how alerts were the birds to the talk of the dogs of the meadow, the researchers created a false predator by tinging a dissectedos to a small remote control vehicle. They sent this field rolling on the meadow of the center-north of Montana towards the nests of Zarapitos, sometimes in silence and sometimes as they reproduced engraved bars of dogs of the meadow.
When the barking reproduced, the zarapitos folded quickly in the grass, hiding when the tissue was about 49 meters (160 feet) away. Without the barking, the remote control turse approached about 16 meters (52 feet) of the nests before the zarapitos seem to feel the danger.
“You have many more possibilities to avoid predation if you adopt that cryptic posture before, and the birds do when they listen to the dogs of the meadow,” said Holly Jones co -author, conservation biologist at the University of Northern Illinois.
It is often thought about the dogs of the meadow as “environmental engineers,” he said, because they build extensive burrows and nibble the meadow grass, keeping the short grass ecosystems intact.
“But now we are realizing that they are also shaping ecosystems by producing and disseminating information,” he said.