Personal information about danger trumps social information from avian alarm calls

Information about predators can mean the difference between life and death, but prey face the challenge of integrating personal information about predators with social information from the alarm calls of others. This challenge might even affect the structure of interspecific information networks: species vary in response to alarm calls, potentially because different foraging ecologies constrain the acquisition of personal information. However, the hypothesis that constrained personal information explains a greater response to alarm calls has not been experimentally tested. We used a within-species test to compare the antipredator responses of New Holland honeyeaters, Phylidonyris novaehollandiae, during contrasting foraging behaviour. Compared to perched birds, which hawk for insects and have a broad view, those foraging on flowers were slower to spot gliding model predators, showing that foraging behaviour can affect predator detection. Furthermore, nectar-foraging birds were more like...天敌相关信息的掌握与否直接决定猎物的生死存亡，但猎物需同时整合两类信息：一是自身侦测到的天敌相关个体信息，二是其他个体通过报警鸣叫声传递的社会信息，这是一项极具挑战性的任务。此类挑战甚至可能影响种间信息网络的结构：不同物种对报警鸣叫声的反应存在显著差异，其潜在诱因或许是不同的觅食生态约束了个体获取天敌信息的能力。然而，"个体获取天敌信息的能力受限，会导致猎物对报警鸣叫声产生更强反应"这一假说尚未经实验验证。本研究采用种内实验设计，对比了新荷兰吸蜜鸟（Phylidonyris novaehollandiae）在不同觅食行为下的反捕食反应。与凌空捕猎昆虫且视野开阔的停栖个体相比，在花上觅食的个体识别滑翔模型天敌的速度更慢，这表明觅食行为会影响猎物对天敌的侦测效率。此外，取食花蜜的个体则更倾向于……