The Effects Of Predation Risk On The Behavior And Energy Metabolism In Striped Field Mouse (Apodemus Agrarius) And House Mice (Mus Musculus)

Prey has formed innate sensitivity to their predator during the long-term evolution history. Odors from urine or fur of an animal contain a lot of information of this species. Prey may take odors from their predator as predation risk, and avoid being preyed by changing their own behavior and physiology response, which is one of is the survival strategies. We used odors from urine and fur of cats as the predation risks under laboratory conditions to determine the effects of predation risk on the behavior and energy metabolism in striped field mouse (Apodemus agrarius) and house mice (Mus musculus). We also investigated the efficiency of different odor sources. This study is helpful to seek effective way of control these two kinds of pests' population quantity on one hand. On the other hand, it lay the theoretical foundation to the study of nerve and behavior in mood and stress.Short-term predation risk can affect the behavior of the striped field mouse. The defensive behavior (ie.concealing behavior) significantly increased. Non-defensive behavior (ie.grooming behavior, foraging behavior) declined significantly. The food-intake of the animal was not affected, but the animal's body weight increased significantly. Regardless of the impact on behavior or the impact on body weight, there were differences between different sex and different age. The effect to the male was bigger than to the female, and the effect to the adult is bigger than to the sub-adult.The behavior and the food-intake of the house mice were affected by the short-term predation risk. The effect to the behavior is also main performance for defensive behavior increasing and non-defensive behavior reducing. Food intake increaced, but body weight was not affected after short-term predation risk. There were differences between different sex and different age too. But the effect to the female was bigger than to the male, this is different from the striped field mouse. This might be related to the different physiologies and endocrine mechanism of the two species.Although the foraging frequence decreased in both two behavior experiments, the food intake didn't decreased after 3 days in cat odor's treatment. So we speculate that in order to meet the energy needs, the two species animal maybe increase the food's quantity of each time, and the total food intake may not be changed.In long-term predation risk, the basal metabolic rate (BMR) was significantly reduced in the striped field mouse. It maybe related to the decreased activities. But the energy metabolism and organ criterion have not changed significantly. Different odor sources have different efficacy. We found that fur-derived predator odors may have a more profound lasting influence on striped field mouse than the odor derived from urine.These results indicate that cat odors could affect the behavior and energymetabolism in striped field mouse and house mice, and the mouse have ability to assess the predation risk and adjust their behaviors according to the degree of the risk.