Does novelty influence the foraging decisions of a scavenger?

• Published in: PeerJ
• Main Authors: Bhattacharjee, Debottam, Sau, Shubhra, Das, Jayjit, Bhadra, Anindita
• Other Authors: The SERB, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India, DST INSPIRE PhD Fellowship, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India, DST INSPIRE Scholarship for Higher Education, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: PeerJ 2024
• Subjects: Canis lupus
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.17121; https://peerj.com/articles/17121.pdf; https://peerj.com/articles/17121.xml; https://peerj.com/articles/17121.html

Acquiring knowledge about the environment is crucial for survival. Animals, often driven by their exploratory tendencies, gather valuable information regarding food resources, shelter, mating partners, etc . However, neophobia, or avoiding novel environmental stimuli, can constrain their exploratory behaviour. While neophobia can reduce potential predation risks, decreased exploratory behaviour resulting from it may limit the ability to discover highly rewarding resources. Dogs ( Canis familiaris ) living in semi-urban and urban environments as free-ranging populations, although subject to various selection forces, typically have negligible predation pressure. These dogs are scavengers in human-dominated environments; thus, selection against object-neophobia can provide benefits when searching for novel food resources. Although captive pack-living dogs are known to be less neophobic than their closest living ancestors, wolves ( Canis lupus ), little is known about free-ranging dogs’ behavioural responses to novel objects, particularly in foraging contexts. Using an object choice experiment, we tested 259 free-ranging dogs from two age classes, adult and juvenile, to investigate their object-neophobia in a scavenging context. We employed a between-subject study design, providing dogs with a familiar and a potentially novel object, both baited with equal, hidden food items. Adult and juvenile dogs significantly inspected the novel object first compared to the familiar one, even when the hidden food item was partially visible. To validate these findings, we compared novel objects with different strengths of olfactory cues (baited vs. false-baited) and found that they were inspected comparably by adults and juveniles. No significant differences were found in the latencies to inspect the objects, suggesting that free-ranging dogs may still be cautious when exploring their environments. These results indicate that free-ranging dogs, evidently from an early ontogenetic phase, do not show object-neophobia, as ...