Territory (animal) - Citizendia

For other uses, see Territoriality (nonverbal communication). Territoriality is a term associated with Nonverbal communication that refers to how people use space to communicate Ownership /occupancy of areas and Possessions

In ethology, sociobiology and behavioral ecology, the term territory refers to any sociographical area that an animal of a particular species consistently defends against conspecifics (and, occasionally, animals of other species). Ethology ( from Greek ἦθος ethos, "character" and λόγος logos, "knowledge") is the scientific study of Animal Sociobiology is a neo-Darwinian and Socialism Synthesis of Scientific disciplines that attempts to explain Social behavior Behavioral ecology is the study of the ecological and evolutionary basis for Animal behavior, and the roles of behavior in enabling an animal to adapt to In Biology, a species is one of the basic units of Biological classification and a Taxonomic rank. Animals that defend territories in this way are referred to as territorial.

1 History
2 Classic territories
3 Defense
4 See also
5 References
6 Further reading

History

The idea of animal territories was first introduced by the British ornithologist Eliot Howard in a book published in 1920. Henry Eliot Howard ( November 13, 1873 - December 26, 1940) was an English Ornithologist, noted for being one of the first Year 1920 ( MCMXX) was a Leap year starting on Thursday (link will display 1920 of the Gregorian calendar In the 1930s it was developed further by the American ornithologist Margaret Morse Nice through research on the song sparrow. Margaret Morse Nice ( December 6, 1883, Amherst Massachusetts - June 26, 1974, Chicago) was an American Ornithologist The Song Sparrow, Melospiza melodia, is a medium-sized American sparrow. It was widely popularised by Robert Ardrey in his book The Territorial Imperative, and the popularity of this book led to an exaggerated perception of the importance of territory in social ethology. Robert Ardrey (b October 16, 1908, Chicago, Illinois —d January 14, 1980, South Africa) was an American In fact only a minority of species maintain territories with well defined boundaries, within which they live and find all the resources they need. Some territories are shared by the animals around the same area and therefore it increases competition

Classic territories

Animals like these defend territories that contain their nest site and sufficient food resources for themselves and their young. Defense rarely takes the form of overt fights: more usually there is a highly noticeable display, which may be visual (as in the red breast of the robin), auditory (as in much bird song, or the calls of gibbons) or olfactory, through the deposit of scent marks. Bird vocalization includes both Bird calls and bird songs In non-technical use bird songs are the bird sounds that are melodious to the human ear Gibbons are the small Apes in the family Hylobatidae. The family is divided into four genera based on their Diploid Chromosome Many territorial mammals use scent-marking to signal the boundaries of their territories; the marks may be deposited by urination, by defecation, or by rubbing parts of the bodies that bear specialised scent glands against the substrate. Urination, also known as micturition, voiding, and more rarely emiction, is the process of disposing Urine from the Urinary bladder Defecation is the final act of Digestion by which organisms eliminate solid semisolid or liquid Waste material ( Faeces) from the Digestive tract Scent glands are found in the genital area of most Mammals and in various other parts of the body such as the underarms of Humans and the Preorbital For example, dogs and other canids scent-mark by urination and defecation, while cats scent-mark by rubbing their faces and flanks against objects. The dog ( Canis lupus familiaris) is a domesticated Subspecies of the gray wolf, a Mammal of the Canidae family of the order The Canidae (ˈkænədiː ′kanə′dē family is a part of the order Carnivora within the Mammals (Class Mammalia Many prosimians use territorial marking; for example, the Red-bellied Lemur creates territories for groups of two to ten individuals in the rainforests of eastern Madagascar by scent marking: the male Diademed Sifaka also scent marks defended territories in some of these same rainforests. Prosimians are the most primitive extant Primates they have characteristics similar to forms that were ancestral to Monkeys Apes and The Red-bellied Lemur ( Eulemur rubriventer) is a medium sized Prosimian with a luxuriant chestnut brown coat Rainforests are Forests characterized by high Rainfall with definitions setting minimum normal annual rainfall between 1750–2000 mm (68-78 inches Madagascar, or Republic of Madagascar (older name Malagasy Republic) is an Island nation in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern The Diademed Sifaka ( Propithecus diadema) is an Endangered species of Sifaka, one of the Lemurs endemic to certain Rainforests

Invertebrates which show territorality include some ants and bees, and the owl limpet ^[1]

Defense

Territories may be held by an individual, a mated pair, or a group. An invertebrate is an Animal lacking a Vertebral column. The group includes 98% of all animal Species — all animals except those in the Chordate Territoriality is not a fixed property of a species: for example, robins defend territories as pairs during the breeding season and as individuals during the winter, while some nectarivores defend territories only during the mornings (when plants are richest in nectar). In species that do not form pair bonds, male and female territories are often independent, in the sense that males defend territories only against other males, and females only against other females; in this case, if the species is polygynous, one male territory will probably contain several female territories, while in some polyandrous species such as the Northern Jacana, this situation is reversed. Polygyny (which comes from neo- Greek: πολύ poly "many" + γυνή gyny "woman" is a specific form of Polygamy, In Social anthropology and Sociobiology, polyandry ( Greek: poly - many andros - man refers to a form of polygamous The Northern Jacana or Northern Jaçana ( Jacana spinosa) is a Wader which is a resident breeder from coastal Mexico to western Panama

Quite often territories that only yield a single resource are defended. For example, European Blackbirds may defend feeding territories that are distant from their nest sites, and in some species that form leks, for example the Uganda kob (a grazing antelope), males defend the lek site (which is used only for mating). The Blackbird, Common Blackbird or Eurasian Blackbird ( Turdus merula) is a species of true thrush which breeds in Europe, Asia A lek is a gathering of Males of certain animal species for the purposes of competitive Mating display The Kob ( Kobus kob) is an Antelope found across Sub-Saharan Africa from Senegal to Sudan. A grazing antelope is any of the Species of Antelope that make up the subfamily Hippotraginae in the family Bovidae, which also includes

Territoriality is only shown by a minority of species. More commonly, an individual or a group of animals will have an area that it habitually uses but does not necessarily defend; this is called its home range. Home range is a concept that can be traced back to a publication in 1943 by W The home ranges of different groups often overlap, and in the overlap areas the groups will tend to avoid each other rather than seeking to expel each other. Within the home range there may be a core area that no other individual group uses, but again this is as a result of avoidance rather than defense.

Behavioural ecologists have argued that food distribution determines whether a species will be territorial or not. Territoriality is only expected to emerge where there is a focused resource that provides enough for the individual or group, within a boundary that is small enough to be defended without the expenditure of too much effort.

Territoriality is least likely with insectivorous birds, where the food supply is plentiful but unpredictably distributed. Swifts rarely defend an area larger than the nest. The swifts are a family Apodidae, of highly aerial Birds They are superficially similar to Swallows but are actually not closely related to those

Conversely, large solitary (or paired) carnivores, such as bears and the bigger raptors require an extensive protected area to guarantee their food supply. Birds of prey are Birds that hunt for food primarily on the wing using their keen senses especially vision This territoriality will only break down when there is a glut of food, for example when Grizzly Bears are attracted to migrating salmon. The Grizzly Bear (Ursus arctos horribilis, also known as the Silvertip Bear, is a Subspecies of Brown bear (Ursus arctos that lives Salmon is the common name for several species of Fish of the family Salmonidae.

References

^ J. In Psychology and other social and Behavioral sciences aggression refers to behavior that is intended to cause harm In Ethology, dear enemy recognition is a situation in which a territorial animal responds more strongly to strangers than to its neighbors from adjacent territories The term polygamy (a Greek word meaning "the practice of multiple marriage" is used in related ways in Social anthropology, Sociobiology, and Stimson (1969). "Territoriality of the owl limpet Lottia gigantea". Ecology, 51(1): 113-118

Contents

History

Classic territories

Defense

See also

References

Further reading