BBC Nature – 25 September 2012
A study published in Animal Behaviour has shown how Jays demonstrate flexible tactics by switching between storing food and stealing from others’ food reserves. Researchers found that the jays' strategy was dependent on the relative social rank of their opponent.
In one context, subjects competed with a dominant conspecific, while in the other the same individuals interacted with a subordinate competitor. When subordinate, birds initially suppressed caching, before caching more in less exposed locations. In contrast, when socially dominant, birds cached more and moved items multiple times. As subordinate pilferers, birds took longer to approach cache sites and approached when the cacher was at a distance, while when dominant, birds rapidly approached the conspecifics’ cache sites, frequently when the cacher was still in the process of caching. Individual jays therefore flexibly switched caching and pilfering tactics in response to the relative dominance of their competitor. We discuss the implications of our results for competing theories on the origin of behavioural flexibility and its underlying complex cognition in the corvid lineage.
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Eurasian jays, Garrulus glandarius, flexibly switch caching and pilfering tactics in response to social context
By Rachael C. Shaw and Nicola S. Clayton