Intro to animal behaviour
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What is ‘ethology?
Ethology looks at why and how Why is this behaviour, how did it evolve And how is it expressed
Apply multiple evolutionary, physiological, and ecological concepts to define animal behaviour.
Animal behaviour is based on what worked in the past, it evolved to be that way. It is done based on the physical abilities of the animal. Driven by need for food and habitat? ecological connection
What is a ‘life history strategy?
Life history is combination of interconnected traits - (when organisms first reproduce, how many offspring they have in each round of reproduction, and how many times reproduction occurs) life history strategy refers to how the life history of the aniamal adapted to the env
How is an ‘evolutionary stable state/strategy’ utilized to explain animal behaviour
Animals have a certain behaviour such that if a new behaviour were to come along it would not survive. ex. a species uses a mating ritual, even if an indiv in the population has another strategy for finding a mate it would not be as successful because the whole population using the mating ritual?
What is an ‘adaptive behaviour?
Behavioural change as a result to change in exteral stimuli that leads to increased fitness increases and indivs evolutionary fitness relative to other indivs in the population may not always look benificial (ex, the mating of the redback spider)
Define a ‘deceitful behaviour.’ In evolutionary context, how is this a misnomer?
Some behaviour that looks to be bad for the individual because it causes death? but in reality it actually increases fitness
What is/are ‘Proximate causes of behaviour
address the mechanisms that produce a behaviour: the environmental stimuli that trigger a behaviour and the genetic and physiological mechanisms that make it possible.
What is/are ‘Ultimate causes of behaviour?
evolutionary significance of a behaviour: how a behaviour increases the evolutionary fitness of the animal demonstrating it, helping it to survive and reproduce in its environment
why does the mating ritual of austrialian redback spiders seem weird but is actually good
as the male is mating with the female he is eaten by her. But this actually increases fitness example is in australian redback spider
Give proximate and ultimate reason why female aust redback spiders eat males during mating
prox - male dangle abdomen in front of jaws. ulti - The female gets nutriants from male, so more nutrients to make eggs
Give proximate and ultimate reason why males are ok with being eaten by females
prox- males somersault is triggered when he inserts the palp into the female sperm receptor ulti - The copulation time increases when the male gets eaten. And also allows him to father more offspring