科研之友
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摘要
Food hoarding is a crucial strategy to cope with the seasonal shortage of food resources in many social animals, but the underlying ecological mechanisms remain unclear. In this study, Brandt's voles were divided into kin group (from the same family) and non-kin group (from different families). We used video camera to record the cooperative food hoarding patterns of different groups and individuals in experimental boxes, and calculated the time of different behaviors. We used correlation analysis to study the association between cost and benefit for cooperative food hoarding individuals, and its influencing factors. We found, as compared to the non-kin group, Brandt's voles in the kin group spent more time on cooperative food hoarding behavior. However, cooperative food hoarding behavior differed greatly among individuals in the same kin group. There was a significant negative correlation between time of hoarding food and time of eating food by voles. Voles with more time of hoarding food showed a significant decrease in testicle index and testosterone content. Our study suggests that kinship is essential for maintaining cooperative food hoarding in voles, but the reproduction of cooperators who largely contributed to food hoarding was inhibited.
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