ArticleBehavioral ecology and sociobiology
Silence is not golden: the hissing calls of tits affect the behaviour of a nest predator.
Article in Behavioral ecology and sociobiology. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed.
- Avian hissing sounds: occurrence, mechanism, ontogeny, function and phylogeny.Royal Society open science · 2025Review
- The influence of body condition and personality on nest defense behavior of Japanese tits (Parus minor).Animal cognition · 2025Article
- Snake-like bird hisses induce anti-predator responses in a frog.BMC ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- Report of a magpie preying on a post-fledgling Daurian redstart.Ecology and evolution · 2023Article
- First description of injury feigning behavior in Godlewski's buntings.Ecology and evolution · 2023Article
- Giant hornet (Royal Society open science · 2021Article
- Article
- Nest defence behavioural reaction norms: testing life-history and parental investment theory predictions.Royal Society open science · 2019Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
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Abstract
abstractNest predation is one of the most important mortality factors of birds. Field observations showed that tits (Paridae) produce hissing calls and, usually, have lower breeding losses than nesting SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT: Nest predation is one of the most important mortality factors of small land birds, but some anti-predatory mechanisms are still poorly recognised. Numerous studies demonstrate that incubating tits make hissing sounds, when a predator is near, but despite almost a century of research, there is little evidence these calls indeed affect behaviour of predators. By using a simple laboratory experiment, we demonstrated that the hissing acoustic signals used by tits may change the behaviour of yellow-necked mice, which are an important predator of cavity-nesting birds in temperate forests. Intruding mice withdrew from cavities where hissing sounds were played back. Our results suggest that the hissing behaviour of tits can change the exploration activity of potential predators and may increase breeding success of this group of birds relative to the flycatchers, which stay silent when their nest is threatened.
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