Scent marking and territoriality

Gilbert, B. K. (1973). Scent marking and territoriality in pronghorn [Antilocapra americana) in Yellowstone National Park. Mammalia 37,25-33. 

Lacher, T. E. J., Bouchardet de Fonseca, G. A., Alves, C., Jr., and Magalhaes-Castro, B. (1981). Exudate-eating, scent marking and territoriality in wild populations of marmosets. AnimalBehaviour 29,306-307. 

Paquet, P. C. and Fuller, W. A. (1990). Scent marking and territoriality in wolves of Riding Mountain National Park. In Chemical Signals in Vertebrates, vol. 5, ed. D. W. Macdonald, D. Miiller-Schwarze, and S. E. Natynczuk, pp. 394-400. Oxford Oxford University Press. 

Gorman, M.L. 1984. Scent marking and territoriality. Acta Zool. Fennica, 171, 49—53. 

Vinson, S. B., Williams, H. J., Frankie, G. W., Wheeler, J. W., Blum, M. S. and Coville, R. E. (1982) Mandibular glands of male Centris adani, their morphology, chemical constituents, and function in scent marking and territorial behavior. J. Chem. Ecol., 8, 319-27. 

Erlinge, S., Sandell, M., and Brinck, C. (1982). Scent-marking and its territorial significance in stoats, Mustda erminea. Animal Behaviour 30,811-818. 

House mice reside together in territorial family groups, consisting of a dominant male with one or more breeding females and subordinate males (Hurst, 1987). Dominant males scent mark their territories extensively with small spots and streaks of urine and will further increase their scent marking rate around competing urine marks found within their territory (Desjardins et al., 1973 Hurst et al., 2001). Dominant males will also... 

This advertisement of dominance through competitive scent marking also provides a mechanism that potential mates could use to assess and compare the relative competitive abilities of different territory owners or dominant individuals. Most importantly, this would allow potential mates to discriminate between those that advertise their apparent high quality through scent marking and the quality of their odor, to select a mate of proven high competitive ability. 

Coppola and O Connell (1988) suggested that rodents may use odors to assess suitability of unknown sites. If individuals use scent marks as territorial advertisement to avoid competition, then dispersers may avoid areas marked by same-sex conspecifics with which they would have to compete for breeding opportunities (Hurst Nevison, 1994 but see Solomon Glickman, 1977 and references therein). Thus settlement on a territory (immigration) may be impeded by the odors of territory owners (Hurst Nevison, 1994 Rosell, Bergan Parker, 1998). 

Owner advantage in contests with intruders depends on the identification of the owner, not as an individual (see below) but as the owner of the territory. Elsewhere I have argued that the function of scent marking in territories is to advertise the owner s status and thus to reduce the cost of territory defence (Gosling, 1982). If this is true then the proper context for scent marking is competitor assessment theory which is an offshoot of the ideas about animal contests mentioned in the previous section. Briefly, animals would be expected to adjust their behaviour to the probability and benefits of winning a contest, and the costs of... 

Cervus elaphus, where the signal is energetically very expensive to produce (Clutton-Brock and Albon, 1979). Scent marking in territories may have evolved as a form of status advertisement because it takes some time to comprehensively mark a territory (one week for a newly arrived Thomson s gazelle male Walther, 1978a) and, since a male that has done this must have successfully defended the territory, it must actually be the owner. The historical element in scent marking thus makes it uniquely cheat-proof. 

Black-Cleworth P. and Verbeme G. (1975). Scent-marking, dominance and flehmen behavior in domestic rabbits in an artificial laboratory territory. Chem Senses Flav 1, 465-494. 

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