Coding of Group Odor in the Subcaudal Gland Secretion of the European Badger Meles meles: Chemical Composition and Pouch Microbiota

Buesching, Christina D.; Tinnesand, Helga Veronica; Sin, YungWa; Rosell, Frank; Burke, Terry; Macdonald, David W.

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-22026-0_5

Cited by 39 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…ferret (Chang et al 2000; red panda, Ailurus fulgens, (Roberts and Kessler 1979), and ringtailed coati, Nasua nasua (Shannon et al 1995) is typically linked to the species' reproductive cycle. In badgers, patterns in scent-marking activity (Buesching and Macdonald 2004), as well as the chemical characteristics of subcaudal (Buesching et al 2002) and anal gland secretions (present study), reflect the seasonal sex-steroid patterns of badgers Sugianto et al 2019) with significantly higher scent-marking activity (Buesching and Macdonald 2004) and latrine usage (Buesching et al 2016) during the mating and cub-rearing season in late winter/spring.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 59%

“…Badger latrines along borders are used by all members of the adjacent social groups (Buesching et al 2016;Delahay et al 2000). While this makes them ideally suited as a node for information exchange between conspecifics (Buesching and Macdonald 2001), it also means encoding individuality is paramount if fecal deposits at group-latrines are to play a role in individual advertisement (Buesching and Macdonald 2001).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Details are given in Table 1 and Table S1 in the Supplementary Material. As part of an ongoing long-term research project, and following the methodology described in Macdonald et al (2009), badgers were trapped three times annually in 2010 and 2011: (i) in spring (May/ June) after cubs were fully weaned and coinciding with the peak in latrine activity (Delahay et al 2000), (ii) in summer (August/September) during lowest food abundance and least latrine activity (Kilshaw et al 2009), and (iii) in autumn (November) during reproductive quiescence (Sugianto et al 2018) when badgers reach their maximum body weight and latrine use is concentrated at feeding sites (Buesching et al 2016).…”

Section: Study Animals and Sample Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Knowing Me, Knowing You: Anal Gland Secretion of European Badgers (Meles meles) Codes for Individuality, Sex and Social Group Membership

et al. 2019

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European badgers, Meles meles, are group-living in the UK, and demarcate their ranges with shared latrines. As carnivores, badgers possess paired anal glands, but olfactory information on the content of badger anal gland secretion (AGS) is largely uninvestigated. Here, we examined the volatile organic compounds (VOCs) of AGS samples from 57 free-living badgers using solid-phase microextraction (SPME) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. AGS was rich in alkanes (C7-C15, 14.3% of identified compounds), aldehydes (C5-C14, 9.7%), phenols (C6-C15, 9.5%), alcohols (C5-C10, 7.3%), aromatic hydrocarbons (C6-C13, 6.8%), ketones (C6-C13, 6.3%) and carboxylic acids (C3-C12, 5.6%) and contained a variety of esters, sulfurous and nitrogenous compounds, and ethers. The number of VOCs per profile ranged from 20 to 111 (mean = 65.4; ± 22.7 SD), but no compound was unique for any of the biological categories. After normalization of the raw data using Probabilistic Quotient Normalization, we produced a resemblance matrix by calculating the Euclidian distances between all sample pairs. PERMANOVA revealed that AGS composition differs between social groups, and concentration and complexity in terms of number of measurable VOCs varies between seasons and years. AGS VOC profiles encode individual identity, sex and vary with female reproductive state, indicating an important function in intraspecific communication. Because AGS is excreted together with fecal deposits, we conclude that chemical complexity of AGS enables particularly latrine-using species, such as badgers, to advertise more complex individual-specific information than in feces alone.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 59%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Study Animals and Sample Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Knowing Me, Knowing You: Anal Gland Secretion of European Badgers (Meles meles) Codes for Individuality, Sex and Social Group Membership

et al. 2019

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“…Mammalian scent marks can originate from a variety of sources, including specialised glandular secretions, urine, and dung. These scent marks relay an assortment of information from territorial state and reproductive condition, to group membership and health (Archunan and Rajagopal 2013;Buesching et al 2016;Leclaire et al 2014;Marneweck et al 2017;Stoffel et al 2015;Zala et al 2004). This information is translated by the presence/absence or concentration of specific volatile organic compounds (VOCs).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Temporal Variation of White Rhino Dung Odours

2017

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In order for an olfactory signal to be effective, it must persist in the environment for an extended period. White rhino dung odours transmit information about sex, age, territorial and oestrous states. As these odours relay important information, temporal changes in the odour emission rate and/or composition may be critical in order for other individuals to obtain this information. Here, we examine how the dung odours of adult white rhinos (male: territorial and non-territorial; female: oestrous and non-oestrous) change over the short (hours) and long (seasons) term using headspace extraction. Additionally, we measure seasonal midden visitation and defecation frequency to link behaviours to seasonal changes in odour longevity. We found that during the dry season, territorial male dung odours persisted for 48 hours, while the odours of all other adults persisted for >48 hours. The high temperature and humidity of the wet season did not affect odour longevity of oestrous females, but decreased dung odour longevity (i.e. increased emission) of territorial males, non-territorial males, and non-oestrous females. Despite this reduction, neither males nor females adjusted their seasonal visitation or defecation frequency. With regard to a temporal indicator, 3,7-dimethly-1,6-octadiene signalled dung age during the wet season, while acetophenone signalled dung age during the dry season. Ultimately, our results provide the first detailed account of temporal changes of dung VOCs, and highlight the limitations of dung as a signalling medium.

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“…As illustrated by the example of the European badger Meles meles, pronounced bias in data collection can thus result in having to re-evaluate established theory when more (and different) data become available (reviewed in Buesching and Stankowich 2017): While for many years, badgers were believed to be strictly territorial (reviewed in Buesching & Macdonald 2001;Roper 2010), maintaining a perimeter scent-fence of so-called border latrines frequented by members of adjoining neighbouring social groups and a grid of group-specific hinterland latrines, more recently, when data on the chemical composition of latrine-based anal- (Tinnesand et al 2015) and subcaudal scent-marks (Buesching et al 2002(Buesching et al , 2016a, but also on individual usage patterns (Kilshaw et al 2009;Ellwood et al 2017) became available, interpretation of border latrines changed from active (Delahay et al 2000) to passive range exclusion (Stewart et al 1997) and are now by many interpreted as information centres for self-advertisement (reviewed in Buesching & Macdonald 2001;Buesching et al 2016b).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Social Function of Latrines: A Hypothesis-Driven Research Approach

Buesching

Jordan

2019

Chemical Signals in Vertebrates 14

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In many mammals, the function of latrine use is still debated. Suggested explanations can be broadly divided into resource defence, information centre/ advertisement, landmarks/ orientation, parasite control, or predator-prey interactions. Here, we develop a hypothesis-driven research framework based on the six categories of data that can be collected from latrines (spatial distribution patterns of latrines; temporal usage patterns of latrines; visit and contribution patterns of individual animals to individual latrines; behaviour of visitors to and/ or users of latrines; the longevity, volatility and lifespan of the scent signals) to help investigate the role of latrine use in any focal species. We emphasise that, due to the complexity of the information content encoded in olfactory signals, in most mammals latrine use is likely multi-functional.

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Coding of Group Odor in the Subcaudal Gland Secretion of the European Badger Meles meles: Chemical Composition and Pouch Microbiota

Cited by 39 publications

References 52 publications

Knowing Me, Knowing You: Anal Gland Secretion of European Badgers (Meles meles) Codes for Individuality, Sex and Social Group Membership

Knowing Me, Knowing You: Anal Gland Secretion of European Badgers (Meles meles) Codes for Individuality, Sex and Social Group Membership

Temporal Variation of White Rhino Dung Odours

The Social Function of Latrines: A Hypothesis-Driven Research Approach

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