For the first time, researchers have shown that non-human primates emit calls in specific sequences to convey the type and location of the threat.
Non-human primates are known to produce calls that signal different kinds of danger. Richard W. Byrne at the University of St Andrews, UK, and his colleagues conducted an experiment on five groups of titi monkeys (Callicebus nigrifrons) living in a reserve to find out whether monkey vocalization encoded predator type (raptor or snake), elevation (tree or ground) or both.
A raptor in the air elicited only calls of type A; a raptor on the ground, calls of type A, followed by B. Conversely, a predator on the ground elicited pure B calls, but a ground predator in the trees brought forth B calls, followed by A.
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Monkeys raise the alarm on predators. Nature 501, 139 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/501139d
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/501139d
