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Differences in measures of boldness even when underlying behavioral syndromes are present in two populations of the song sparrow (Melospiza melodia)

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Abstract

One commonly studied behavioral syndrome is the correlation between aggression and boldness. Studies in song sparrows (M. melodia) have found greater aggression and boldness in urban populations and a correlation between aggression and boldness in rural populations, but not within urban populations. In previous studies, boldness was measured as flight initiation distance (FID), which may reflect habituation by urban birds to human presence. In this study, we measured boldness using playbacks of heterospecific alarm calls and investigated whether higher boldness is a general trait of urban birds and whether the same pattern of correlations between aggression and boldness would be seen. We conducted trials involving FID, alarm call playbacks and conspecific song playbacks on 25 birds from both an urban and a rural site. The results showed that urban birds were bolder, as measured by FID and response to alarm calls. Boldness and aggression were correlated in rural birds with each method of measuring boldness but were correlated in urban birds only when using alarm call playbacks. Our results suggest that a behavioral syndrome exists in both urban and rural populations but that urban birds are able to decrease their response to human disturbance.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the Department of Biology at Western Carolina University for support, and we thank two anonymous reviewers for their comments on the manuscript. We also thank the H. F. Cotton and Katherine P. Robinson professorship for support. Finally, we thank Mike LaVoie and the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians for allowing us to work at Kituwah.

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  1. Department of Biology, Western Carolina University, 132, Natural Sciences Building, Cullowhee, NC, 28723, USA

    Rachel Elizabeth Myers & Jeremy Hyman

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  1. Rachel Elizabeth Myers
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  2. Jeremy Hyman
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Correspondence to Jeremy Hyman.

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Myers, R.E., Hyman, J. Differences in measures of boldness even when underlying behavioral syndromes are present in two populations of the song sparrow (Melospiza melodia). J Ethol 34, 197–206 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10164-016-0465-9

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