Abstract
A cuckoo Cuculus canorus dummy was exposed at 24 nests of great reed warbler Acrocephalus arundinaceus (GRW) and 34 nests of reed warbler Acrocephalus scirpaceus (RW) during the egg-laying stage. The eight GRW pairs attacked the cuckoo directly, striking the dummy, but such a behaviour was not recorded in RWs. Also, other behavioural measures (closest distance from the model, duration of distress calls and number of excitement calls) indicated a lower level of defence by RWs compared to GRWs. In the study area, the parasitism rate was much lower in GRWs (1.7% of nests) than in RWs (11.3%). We suggest that one of the reasons for the lower level of cuckoo parasitism on GRWs is its stronger nest defence and hence higher risk of injury or even death for the cuckoo during egg dumping.
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Acknowledgments
We thank Wanda Zdunek and Zbigniew Pietrzak for field assistance. We are grateful to the anonymous referee for constructive comments. We appreciate financial support from the Polish State Committee for Scientific Research, grant no. 4675/PB/IZ/02. The research was approved by the local Ethical Commission. We declare that the experiments comply with the current laws of Poland.
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Communicated by F. Bairlein
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Dyrcz, A., Hałupka, L. Great reed warbler Acrocephalus arundinaceus and reed warbler Acrocephalus scirpaceus respond differently to cuckoo dummy at the nest. J Ornithol 147, 649–652 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10336-006-0097-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10336-006-0097-x