Click here to close
Hello! We notice that you are using Internet Explorer, which is not supported by Xenbase and may cause the site to display incorrectly.
We suggest using a current version of Chrome,
FireFox, or Safari.
Investigating signal modalities of aposematism in a poison frog.
Stuckert AMM
,
Summers K
.
???displayArticle.abstract???
Aposematic species combine a conspicuous signal with a secondary defence, the majority of which are studied in the context of a visual signal. While multimodality of the aposematic signal appears to be common in invertebrate species, we know very little about the presence or absence of multimodality in vertebrates. Here, we examine the possibility of multimodality of aposematism in the green-and-black poison frog, Dendrobates auratus. Using a non-visual predator (the cat-eyed snake, Leptodeira annulata) and extractions of chemicals in frog skins, we test whether there is sufficient non-visual information for predators to avoid this aposematic species without using visual cues. We found that experienced predators avoid chemicals in this poison frog's skin by olfactory cues alone in trials with live frogs and extracts from captive poison frogs, whereas extracts from wild poison frogs did not lead to avoidance behaviours in predators. Further, in our limited sampling, naïve predators demonstrate no avoidance. This not only indicates that predators can make informed decisions from the frog's odour, but also indicates that avoidance based on olfactory cue is a learned response.
FIGURE 1
Focal species used in this study. Clockwise from left: cat-eyed snake (Leptodeira annulata), green-and-black poison frog (Dendrobates auratus) and tungara frog (Engystomops pustulosus).
FIGURE 2
Initial snake response in each trial. The central dot indicates the mean response, and the error bars represent 95% confidence intervals. The horizontal line indicates the 50% line. A proportion of 1 would indicate all snakes initially investigated the poison frog or poison frog extract, whereas a proportion of 0 indicates all snakes initially investigated the tungara frog or extract. Sample size for trials with adults (live frogs, captive extract and wild extract) are N = 10; sample size for the juvenile trials is N = 2.
FIGURE 3
Proportion of overall time investigating each of the dyadic pair. The central dot indicates the mean response, and the error bars represent 95% confidence intervals. The horizontal line indicates the 50% line. In each trial, 0 is spending all time with the tungara frog or extract, and 1 is the full length of time with the poison frog or poison frog extract. Sample size for trials with adults (live frogs, captive extract and wild extract) is N = 10; sample size for the juvenile trials is N = 2.
Figure S1 Proportion of overall time investigating each of the dyadic pair. The central dot indicates the mean response, and the error boars represent 95% confidence intervals. The horizontal line indicates the 50% line. In each trial, 0 is spending all time with the tungara frog or extract, and 1 is the full length of time with the poison frog or poison frog extract. Sample size for trials with adults (live frogs, captive extract, and wild extract) are N = 10; sample size for the juvenile trials is N = 2. Left side includes data from all trials, right side includes only the first night.
