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Behavioral responses to echolocation calls from sympatric heterospecific bats: implications for interspecific competition

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Abstract

Mutual recognition is the product of species coexistence, and has direct effects on survival and reproduction of animals. Bats are able to discriminate between sympatric different heterospecifics based on their echolocation calls, which has been shown both in free-flying and captive bats. To date, however, the factors that may determine the behavioral responses of bats to echolocation calls from sympatric heterospecifics have rarely been tested, especially under well-controlled conditions in captive bats. Hence, we aimed at tackling this question by performing playback experiments (habituation–dishabituation) with three horseshoe bat species within the constant-frequency bat guild, which included big-eared horseshoe bats (Rhinolophus macrotis), Blyth’s horseshoe bats (Rhinolophus lepidus), and Chinese horseshoe bats (Rhinolophus sinicus). We studied the behavioral responses of these three species to echolocation calls of conspecifics, to other two species, and to another heterospecifics bat, Stoliczka’s trident bat (Asellisus stoliczkanus), which also belongs to this guild. We found that the three rhinolophid species displayed a series of distinct behaviors to heterospecific echolocation but few to conspecific calls after habituation, suggesting that they may have been able to discriminate sympatric heterospecific echolocation calls from those of conspecifics. Interestingly, the behavioral responses to heterospecific calls were positively correlated with the interspecific overlap index in trophic niche, whereas call design had only a minor effect. This implies that the behavioral responses of these bats to heterospecific echolocation calls may be related to the degree of interspecific food competition.

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Acknowledgments

The work was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 31030011, 31270414, 31100280, 31100281). We would like to thank Mr. Fushun Yang and his family, Lifen Xie, and Xiong Guo for their help in the field, and Jinhong Luo for his invaluable suggestions and comments on the manuscript. We also thank Songtao Yang for his help in making the experimental box and Lei Wang for his help in diet analysis of bats.

Ethical standards

All experiments were approved by the Department of Wildlife Administration in Shuanghe Township, Yunnan province, China.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Jilin Key Laboratory of Animal Resource Conservation and Utilization, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, Jilin, People’s Republic of China

    Yuanyuan Li, Jing Wang, Bo Luo, Tinglei Jiang, Siliu Yang, Xiaobin Huang, Xinke Yue & Jiang Feng

  2. Key Laboratory for Wetland Ecology and Vegetation Restoration of National Environmental Protection, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, Jilin, People’s Republic of China

    Yuanyuan Li, Jing Wang, Bo Luo, Tinglei Jiang, Siliu Yang, Xiaobin Huang, Xinke Yue & Jiang Feng

  3. Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, 90095-1606, USA

    Walter Metzner

  4. College of Life Science, Yunnan Normal University, Kunming, Yunnan, People’s Republic of China

    Limin Shi

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  1. Yuanyuan Li
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  2. Jing Wang
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  10. Jiang Feng
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Correspondence to Walter Metzner or Jiang Feng.

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Communicated by C. Voigt

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Li, Y., Wang, J., Metzner, W. et al. Behavioral responses to echolocation calls from sympatric heterospecific bats: implications for interspecific competition. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 68, 657–667 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-013-1680-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-013-1680-9

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