Animal Behaviour

INTRODUCTION Animals behave in different ways: - HOP -RUN

- WALK

- SWIM - FLY

- BURROW - CRAWL

INTRODUCTION Many engage in complex rituals for attracting mates - employ tricks for finding food, avoiding enemies and raising their young. - They build spider webs, beehives, coral reefs, bird nests, and beaver dams to provide shelter and to obtain and store food

INTRODUCTION contd. There are no genes that directly code for behaviour, - play a role in behaviours. Animal beahaviour - influenced by the external environment. through development of nervous and hormonal mechanisms. Majority of the behaviour observed in animals is adaptive.

EVOLUTION All species have descended from a common ancestor (C.A) Evolutionary changes of species from their ancestral forms may have resulted in behavioural changes of the species. Evolutionary changes are studied - phylogeny - comparison of the behaviour patterns of species descended from a recent C.A

EVOLUTION contd. Evolution is due to natural selection. Natural selection favours, - animals that leave more offspring than the average for their species. - hence behaviour of animals adapted to their environments. Behavioural evolution is gradual - gradual accumulation of many small adaptive changes, result in the formation of traits that differ greatly from the ancestral characteristic.

APPROACH TO ANIMAL BEHAVIOUR The cause of behaviour is understood, in the four levels of analysis: - proximate or immediate - ultimate or long-term causes of behaviour Proximate and ultimate causes are interrelated. naturally selected genotype can exert proximate influences over individual’s development, affecting: - nature of the mechanisms = enables it to do certain things.

APPROACH TO ANIMAL BEHAVIOUR Development of any trait - result of G X E interaction. Environment = material environment and experiential environment. Genes to respond to environmental signals- altering activity = to changes in the gene products. Behavioural differences – genetically or environmentally determined

APPROACH TO ANIMAL BEHAVIOUR Behavioural development has adaptive features: (1) development of homeostasis (2) Developmental switch mechanisms (3) Learning mechanisms Learning reflects past selection for capacity to make adaptive adjustments in behaviour that match the environment of the individual

NEURAL MECHANISM AND HORMONES  Behaviour is controlled by the nervous system, which is made up of neurons and operates electrically and chemically. Neurons are connected with each other at synapses which enable the control of flexible and complicated behaviour. Hormones - chemicals that re released by certain organs that influence other organs in the body. Hormones can increase, or decrease, the chance that particular behaviour patterns will be performed

NEURAL MECHANISM AND HORMONES Animal’s environment provides various stimuli that could trigger contradictory responses, and because its physical and social environment often changes over time, animals gain by having mechanisms that set priorities for different behavioural options. Such as behavioural centres that have the capacity to inhibit one another, so that animals do not try to do several things simultaneously. Nature of the inhibitory relationships between neural command centres is influenced by the environment, - environment changes they also change, hence they are detected by neural mechanisms and then translated into hormonal messages.

DEVELOPMENT OF BEHAVIOUR Majority of the behaviour observed in animals is adaptive. They respond to appropriate stimuli in an efficient manner, -feed themselves -find shelter -mate and rear families

DEVELOPMENT OF BEHAVIOUR Learning, Memory and Communication Learning: - Associative - Non-Associative * habituation * sensitization

Learning, Memory and Communication Non-associative learning also known as conditioning two forms: - classical conditioning e.g. Pavlov dogs and in courting gouramis - operant conditioning e.g. pigeons learning to peck at disks in order to obtain food

DEVELOPMENT OF BEHAVIOUR Birds Characteristic Song Bird species associated with its own distinctive song - Adaptation e.g. ovenbird sings “teacher-teacher-teacher”

Birds Characteristic Song Song learning dependant - genetic information - environmental contribution Two phases to learning a song - memory phase - practice phase

MIGRATION Migration is any pattern of movement (back and forth) by living things between TWO relatively distinct LOCATIONS. e.g. Mass movement of herds of wildebeest

MIGRATION Seasonal migrations of birds - SWALLOWS - BUTTERFLIES

MIGRATION Each Breed - SPECIFIC as to which habitat it resides. Favourable environments: - sufficient food - correct type food - correct temperature and habitat - reduced number of animals inhabiting that environment - no parasitises and predators

MIGRATION WHY DO ANIMALS MIGRATE? locate SUPERIOR environments - requires mechanism Mechanisms vary - sensory range e.g. Wildebeest rely on sensing distant rainfall using eyes and ears therefore migrate in that direction.

SEXUAL BEHAVIOUR Reproduction - mate with correct species - competition to court (attract) Courtship - behavioural interaction of the male and female that leads to fertilisation of eggs and sperms. Darwin’s Theory: - States in most species, males compete for, and females select, mates

SEXUAL BEHAVIOUR contd. Males compete for females, - physical fighting - subtle invisible competition among sperm within the female reproductive system. Mate choice by females occurs in species - Males provide no material benefits. Selective females - gain by securing genes that enhance the viability of their offspring

E.g. Female choice: extravagant and probably deleterious male traits such as the peacock’s tail. Through experimentation, female prefer males with longer than average tails

CONCLUSION Animal behaviour is not caused by the animal’s genes or by its environment alone, but by G X E interaction. -Determines how an animal will behave. The animal's nature is influenced by both genetics and learning.

The End!