Communication Behavior Of Red Panda, Ailurus Fulgens

The attention and research about red panda is just fewer to giant panda in the last two century, for its beautiful fur, exiguous and cabined distribution, particular behavior, undetermined taxonomic position, and so on. In order to deeply and systemic understand the character of its chemistry communication, the early communication between mother and infant, and the developmental process of early mother-infant relationship, the author researched the red panda in Chongqing zoo and Chongqing safari park, observed its feedback to odor stimulation which come from different odor source, gender and individual, the character communication behavior between mother and infant in the first month after birth, and the developmental process of the mother-infant relationship, and also assayed chemical character of urine by GC-MS.The main results and conclusions are as follows:1. Behavioral responses of the red panda to opposite- and same-sex scents in breeding season.In comparison with control observations, males and females displayed a dramatic increase in activity, rubbing, licking, sniffing, sniffing urine, sniffing feces and urinate, when entering pen filled with else odors. Male showed a marked preference for female odors, activity, anal marking and licking more in response to female than male odors. Male also displayed more activity, anal marking, licking, sniffing when encountering male than female odors. Weather male nor female didn't show more significant defecating in response to else odors. This indicated that both male and female could identify gender and individuality via odors and there don't have individual and gender information in feces. The results also suggest that discrimination individuality and gender is facilitated by gustatory or vomeronasal analysis made possible by direct contact with the scent. 2. Behavioral responses of red panda to urine scent in non-breeding seasonThe male corresponding behavior responses to urine scent means that red panda can receive urine odor signal from the same and opposite sex; the frequency of urinating stimulated by the urine odor in different sex showed significant differences, which means the most important effect of the signal communication via urine is to territory occupancy protection.Similarly, the female can also receive urine odor signal of the same and opposite sex, but the frequency of urinating stimulated by the urine odor in different sex didn't show markedly difference, which may show that female individual can not distinguish sex by urine odor.3. Behavioral responses of red panda to anogenital gland secretions scent in non-breeding seasonThe male can receive signal in the odor of anogenital gland secretion, and arose obvious territorial behavior, but can not distinguish sex via anogenital gland secretion scent.The urinating frequency of female individual stimulated by anogenital gland secretion scent increases markedly, indicates the anogenital gland secretion scent can promote the territorial behavior of female; but the non-significant differences of female's behavior response to anogenital gland secretion scent of different sex means that the female individual may not distinguish sex by the odor signal of anogenital gland secretion.4. Change of stereotypic behavior response to the odor of urine and anogenital gland secretion scent.Compared to the control, the frequency of stereotypic behavior response to the odor of urine and anogenital gland secretion of the same and the opposite sex decreases markedly, which indicated that enclose red panda in mated or in small group may reduce or eliminate some stereotypic behavior.5. The contrast of chemical communication behavior between males and females in non-breeding seasonThe chemical communication behavior of females depend more on vomeronasal system, compared with males in non-breeding season. The males occupy territory by urinating and anogenital gland secretion, while females sign territory mainly via anogenital gland secretion, the effect of urine in territorial sign is not obvious.6. The happening and developing process of mother-infant relationship in the first month after birth.The frequency of feeling and chemical communication behavior between mother and infant in the pre-period are higher than in the mid-period and post-period; the frequency of aural communication and visual communication behavior between mother and infant in the mid-period are higher than in the pre-period and post-period. The results indicate that the change of the communication behavior manner between mother and children adapt to the developmental process of mother-infant relationship and the growth rule of the children.7. Chemical characterization of urinary putative pheromones in red panda.To characterize the potential pheromonal signal, urine-derived volatiles from both males and females were analyzed by gas chromatography and mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and compared with to each other. More than 67 urinary compounds were identified. Based on 49 common compounds (relative abundances of each >0.1%) shared by more than 10% of all samples. We identified ketones, alkanes, alcohols, aldehydes, terpenes, alkenes and amines. The chemical composition of each urine sample was individual-specific. Although none of these compounds was sex-specific, the relative abundances of several compounds differed between males and females. This result shows that information about sex could be coded in the analog form (different amounts of the same compounds).