ASSESSING CHEMOSENSORY PERCEPTION IN SUBTERRANEAN MOLE-RATS - DIFFERENT RESPONSES TO SMELLING VERSUS TOUCHING ODOROUS STIMULI

A new bioassay was developed to enable quantitative and qualitative as sessment of subterranean mammals' responses to chemosensory stimuli. M ole rats of the Spalax ehrenbergi superspecies of Israel responded dif ferently to the odours of conspecific and heterospecific urine dependi ng upon whether they had previous experience with touching the urine w ith their noses. Mole rats were initially indifferent or slightly attr acted to the odour of both conspecific and heterospecific same-sex uri ne although their behaviour indicated that they could smell it. When a nimals were given the opportunity to touch the stimulus with their nos es, they tended to avoid both types of urine. When exposed to the odou r alone, in a separate experiment that followed the touch experiment, the avoidance tendency remained. These results suggest that the animal learns about the odour of the urine through nasal contact with it. Mo le rats were indifferent to smelling and touching their own urine and urine of a novel non-competitor rodent (guinea pig, Cavia porcellus) a nd avoided the urine of a potential predator (marbled polecat, Vormela peregusna) without the necessity of touching it.