title: Crying wolf to a predator: deceptive vocal mimicry by a bird protecting young.
abstract: Animals often mimic dangerous or toxic species to deter predators; however, mimicry of such species may not always be possible and mimicry of benign species seems unlikely to confer anti-predator benefits. We reveal a system in which a bird mimics the alarm calls of harmless species to fool a predator 40 times its size and protect its offspring against attack. Our experiments revealed that brown thornbills (Acanthiza pusilla) mimic a chorus of other species' aerial alarm calls, a cue of an Accipiter hawk in flight, when predators attack their nest. The absence of any flying predators in this context implies that these alarms convey deceptive information about the type of danger present. Experiments on the primary nest predators of thornbills, pied currawongs (Strepera graculina), revealed that the predators treat these alarms as if they themselves are threatened by flying hawks, either by scanning the sky for danger or fleeing, confirming a deceptive function. In turn, these distractions delay attack and provide thornbill nestlings with an opportunity to escape. This sophisticated defence strategy exploits the complex web of interactions among multiple species across several trophic levels, and in particular exploits a predator's ability to eavesdrop on and respond appropriately to heterospecific alarm calls. Our findings demonstrate that prey can fool predators by deceptively mimicking alarm calls of harmless species, suggesting that defensive mimicry could be more widespread because of indirect effects on predators within a web of eavesdropping.
authors.affiliation: Research School of Biology, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia brani.igic@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Branislav
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Igic
authors.affiliation: Research School of Biology, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Jessica
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: McLachlan
authors.affiliation: Research School of Biology, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland.
authors.forename: Inkeri
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Lehtinen
authors.affiliation: Research School of Biology, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia.
authors.forename: Robert D
authors.initials: RD
authors.lastname: Magrath
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D008192:Deception; D020308:Songbirds / Q000502:physiology*; D013045:Species Specificity; D014828:Vocalization, Animal
keywords: alarm call; anti-predator; deception; interspecific eavesdropping; mimicry; nest defence