Funding: Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes, Serengetiepark-Stiftung, 17.650 EUR
Project Details:
Vocal communication plays an important role in coordinating social interactions. Vocalizations convey various information?s about the sender itself (e.g., physical characteristics, emotional state) as well as about the situation in which the sender is (e.g., mating, mother-infant communication). Sociality has been hypothesized to be a driving factor of the evolution of complex communication systems: Thus, the majority of studies on acoustic communication focussed on species living in complex social systems. However, also species living in less complex systems have to communicate to each other. Thus, in this study we investigate vocal communication in a mammalian species living in a less complex social system, the white rhinoceros. In this species, females and subadults form temporally stable groups whereas bulls live solitarily. To get insight into the vocal complexity, vocal repertoires have to be established. To date, two publications exist on the vocal repertoire of the white rhinoceros describing 10 to 11 distinct vocalizations, but both coincide only in five call types. Whereas Owen-Smith, (1973) characterized the call types only based on onomatopoetic descriptions of free-living rhinoceros, Policht et al., (2008) conducted a detailed multi-parametric sound analysis combined with statistical methods on a captive rhinoceros herd of a different subspecies. Thus, captivity and/or subspecies differences may also affect the results. To clarify the vocal repertoire of the white rhinoceros and to investigate the effect of captivity on vocal production, we compare the vocal repertoires of captive rhinoceros herd of different zoos and in the field (Ziwa Rhino Sancatury).
Results:
e.g.,
Pfannerstill, V.; Härdtner, R.; Maboga, O. S.; Balkenhol, N.; Bennitt, E.; Scheumann, M. (2023). Dehorning impacts white rhinoceros behaviour less than social events: evidence from Botswana. Journal of Zoology, 321(4), 249-259.
Pfannerstill, V.; Balkenhol, N.; Bennitt, E.; Maboga, O. S.; Scheumann, M. (2023). Assessing the potential of conspecific playbacks as a post‐translocation management tool for white rhinoceros. Conservation Science and Practice, 5(9), e12996.
Linn, S. N.; Schmidt, S.; & Scheumann, M. (2021). Individual distinctiveness across call types of the southern white rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum simum). Journal of Mammalogy, 102(2), 440-456.
Linn, S.N.; Boeer, M.; Scheumann, M. (2018). First insights into the vocal repertoire of infant and juvenile Southern white rhinoceros. PLoS ONE 13(3): e0192166. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0192166
Cooperation Partners:
Vera Pfannerstill, Universität Göttingen
Sabrina Linn, Zoo Frankfurt
Daniela Lahn, Zoo Rostock
Emily Bennitt, Botswana
Felix Patton, Ziwa Rhino Sancatury, Uganda
Serengeti-Park Hodenhagen
Zoo Osnabrück
Allwetterzoo Münster
Zoo Augsburg
Zoo Dortmund
Zoo Schwerin
Zoo Erfurt
Zoom Erlebniswelt Gelsenkirchen
Knuthenborg Safaripark, Dänemark
Zoo Amneville, Frankreich
Planét Sauvage, Frankreich