Program in Ecology, Department of Zoology and Physiology, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY 82071, USA.
Wyoming Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, Department of Zoology and Physiology, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY 82071, USA.
Science. 2018 Sep 7;361(6406):1023-1025. doi: 10.1126/science.aat0985.
Ungulate migrations are assumed to stem from learning and cultural transmission of information regarding seasonal distribution of forage, but this hypothesis has not been tested empirically. We compared the migratory propensities of bighorn sheep and moose translocated into novel habitats with those of historical populations that had persisted for hundreds of years. Whereas individuals from historical populations were largely migratory, translocated individuals initially were not. After multiple decades, however, translocated populations gained knowledge about surfing green waves of forage (tracking plant phenology) and increased their propensity to migrate. Our findings indicate that learning and cultural transmission are the primary mechanisms by which ungulate migrations evolve. Loss of migration will therefore expunge generations of knowledge about the locations of high-quality forage and likely suppress population abundance.
有假设认为，有蹄类动物的迁徙源自于关于草料季节性分布的学习和文化信息的传递，但这一假说尚未经过实证检验。我们比较了被转移到新栖息地的大角羊和驼鹿与已经存在了数百年的历史种群的迁徙倾向。历史种群中的个体主要是迁徙的，而被转移的个体则不是。然而，经过几十年的时间，被转移的种群逐渐掌握了冲浪草料绿波的知识（追踪植物物候），并增加了它们迁徙的倾向。我们的研究结果表明，学习和文化传递是有蹄类动物迁徙进化的主要机制。因此，迁徙的丧失将消除几代人有关优质草料位置的知识，并可能抑制种群数量。
