Wood mice aggressiveness and flight response to human handling: Effect of individual and environmental factors

Abstract

Numerous studies have examined human disturbance repercussions on wildlife, mainly focused on the effects on behaviour, reproductive success and population dynamics. However, few studies have addressed the behaviour of prey species during and after human capture and handling and how this may correlate to individual characteristics or variation in their physical environment they inhabit. We explored wood mouse’s fleeing and aggressive behaviours in response to captures by human in their natural habitat. Eighty‐seven wood mice were caught using Sherman live traps. For each trapped individual, aggressiveness was measured as the total number of bites inflicted upon the investigator during handling time. Afterwards, each mouse was released in a two‐metre radius partially covered vegetation area that allowed visual mouse tracking by the observer and flight behaviour was registered by individual one‐zero focal sampling technique during 2 min. Both aggressiveness and fleeing behaviour were analysed regarding individual (sex, reproductive status, age) and environmental factors (habitat and season). Males, adults and breeding individuals showed heightened aggression levels. Higher aggressiveness levels were found in wood mice occupying scrubland and during summer and autumn. The flight response was exclusively explained by reproductive status, whereby breeding individuals spent more time on fast escape than nonbreeding ones. These results indicate that both individual and environmental factors seem to influence defensive behaviours in the wood mouse during and after being captured by a human. Since human disturbance shares many aspects with the predation risk, behavioural responses found to captures may likely be influenced by previous experience of individuals with predators as well as to seasonal and habitat features conditioning predators’ densities but also protection against them.

Stressful living in lower‐quality habitats? Body mass, feeding behavior and physiological stress levels in wild wood mouse populations

“…This variation in age population dynamics with habitat type has been previously found in this and other rodent species (Gorman et al 1993;Meri et al 2008;Malo et al 2013;Martineau et al 2016). Because the value of habitat may be reduced by interferences from dominant individuals (Morris 2003), it seems that interspecific competition, territoriality and the higher aggression rates by largest individuals (Hernández et al 2018) may be responsible for this habitat segregation.…”

Behavioral responses of the European mink in the face of different threats: conspecific competitors, predators, and anthropic disturbances

“…These cues alert them to the presence of competitors, predators, and anthropic disturbances 4 . Thus, animals adopt different strategies that affect their ecology, either altering their behavior or/and triggering a stress response 5 , 6 . The most appropriate strategy is to assess the risk of threat, and the costs and benefits it brings in terms of survival, reproduction, or feeding time 7 .…”

Wood mouse feeding effort and decision-making when encountering a restricted unknown food source

“…In breeding adult males, the testicles were bigger, whereas breeding adult females showed conspicuous nipples on the abdomen and thorax and the vaginal membrane appeared perforated. Harmless waterproof paints (Marking stick DFV, www.divasa-farmavic.com) were used to mark captured individuals in non-conspicuous areas (e.g., ears, toes and tail) for discriminating recaptures [27]. Finally, all captured animals were immediately released after handling in the same place of capture.…”