The nature and strength of social motivations in young farmed silver fox vixens (Vulpes vulpes)

Abstract

To investigate the strength of social motivation and the motives underlying social contact in farmed silver foxes (Vulpes vulpes), we housed six young vixens continuously in a closed economy operant apparatus and measured their 'maximum price paid' when required to perform a task to obtain unrestricted social contact or food (a 'yardstick' resource). In the former trials, vixens of the same-age and origin acted as stimulus animals (N = 6), and both test and stimulus foxes could decide their own visit durations to a shared compartment. Their motives for visiting this 'social compartment' were examined by recording their behaviour during social contact. When access was almost free (a baseline fixed ratio schedule of 1) the test vixens visited the stimulus fox 30.3 AE 4.3 times and spent 45% of the time together per 24 h. The stimulus foxes spent on average 80% per 24 h in the shared compartment and visited this cage 40.7 AE 9.6 times per 24 h. When higher costs were imposed, the test vixens proved willing to pay to access the stimulus vixens and the average maximum price paid for contact was 38.3 AE 8.3% of the price paid for food when hungry. During the time spent together, the stimulus foxes made use of their opportunity to leave the cage, on average 1.43 AE 0.20 times per visit. The behaviour recordings showed that during initial encounters the vixens would fight to establish dominance, and in four of the pairs the test subject emerged as the dominant individual. However, during subsequent interactions, no serious aggression was recorded and social behaviour was characterised by higher levels of sniffing and grooming (23.7 AE 4.3 times/h), play signals (10.5 AE 4.1 times/h) and agonistic displays (5.5 AE 2.5 times/h). Not all of the time together was used for social interaction and during the observation period, the vixens allocated 33.1 AE 6.9% of the time to synchronous resting. We conclude that young silver fox vixens were motivated for social contact, and that this contact was beneficial for welfare due to the low level of aggression and the occurrence of grooming and play. #

Two's company? Solitary vixens’ motivations for seeking social contact

“…Thus, the experimental animals could see and hear each other during the experiments, just like foxes in typical farm housing. Because the foxes had previously completed parallel tests as juveniles, they were well trained and habituated quickly to the apparatus (for a detailed description of training, see Hovland et al, 2008).…”

“…In the social operant test, five vixens acted as test subjects while the other five were companions or stimulus animals. All foxes had previously participated in a similar operant experiment as sub-adults/juveniles and details on their training as cubs is described in Hovland et al (2008). Then, they were tested in different pairs from the ones they were placed in as adults.…”

“…Pedersen et al, 2002). Using this approach, Hovland et al (2008) examined the strength of social motivations in sub-adult female silver foxes using a 'closed-economy' operant apparatus in which animals were housed continuously and able to decide their own interaction time with conspecifics after paying an access fee that was increased daily until the maximum price was reached. In the present study, we modified the same set-up to measure the strength of social motivation in these vixens as adults, relative to their motivation for food.…”

Spiny lobsters use urine-borne olfactory signaling and physical aggressive behaviors to influence social status of conspecifics

“…Many animals compete with conspecifics to gain better access to food, shelters, mates and other resources (Rowell, 1974;Drews, 1993;Barroso et al, 2000;Petrulis et al, 2004;Burmeister et al, 2005;Gherardi, 2006;Hovland et al, 2008;Izawa and Watanabe, 2008;Val-Laillet et al, 2008). This competition, which is common among gregarious animals (Drews, 1993), often involves agonistic behaviors, such as aggressive physical acts, as well as ritualized behaviors, which may include signals used in communication.…”

Complex housing environment for farmed blue foxes (Vulpes lagopus): use of various resources

“…One way of enriching the housing environment is social housing of juvenile foxes, which is typically applied on commercial farms. The pairor group housing has proved beneficial for the welfare of juvenile blue foxes and silver foxes (V. vulpes : Ahola 2002;Hovland et al, 2008), although not in all group compositions and not necessarily throughout the production period. Instead, social housing of adult foxes induces aggression (silver foxes: Hovland et al, 2010a and2010b).…”