Parent-offspring recognition in thick-billed murres (Aves: Alcidae)

Abstract

Using field experiments, we investigated the development of parent-offspring recognition in the thick-billed murre, Uria lomvia. Cross-fostering experiments (N=73) showed that the likelihood of parents accepting a foreign chick decreased with chick age. Simultaneous-choice playback experiments demonstrated that chicks discriminate between the calls of their parents and both strange and familiar adult conspecifics from as early as 3 days old. In presentation experiments with chicks of fledging age (>/=14 days), adults responded more strongly to the calls of their own chicks than to other familiar chicks from the same breeding ledge. Results are consistent with those of earlier studies of parent-offspring recognition in the congeneric and ecologically similar common murre, U. aalge, which were among the first to suggest that parent birds and their chicks can identify each other's calls. Copyright 1998 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. Copyright 1998 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.