MODE OF FORAGING COMPETITION IS RELATED TO TUTOR PREFERENCE IN ZENAIDA-AURITA

This study compared the direction of social learning in 2 populations of Barbados Zenaida doves (Zenaida aurita). One population (St. James) is territorial; it competes aggressively with conspecifics but scramb le competes with heterospecifics. The other population (Deep Water Har bour) forages in large homospecific flocks. Field observations were co nducted to quantify intraspecific and interspecific patterns of foragi ng association and aggression. Wild-caught doves from both areas were then tested on novel foraging tasks demonstrated by either a conspecif ic or a heterospecific tutor. In all experiments, St. James doves lear ned more readily from the heterospecific tutor (Carib grackle [Quiscal us lugubris]), whereas Deep Water Harbour doves learned more readily f rom the conspecific tutor. The type of competitive feeding interaction in the field (i.e., scramble vs. interference) appears to better pred ict the pattern of social learning in an experiment than does species identity.