Evidence of individual odors and individual discrimination in the raccoon, Procyon lotor

Although raccoons (Procyon lotor) were originally categorized as solitary carnivores, recent evidence shows that some raccoons have overlapping home ranges, travel in groups, and share dens. Moreover, raccoons use communal latrines and scent mark, suggesting that chemical signals may be important fo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of mammalogy Vol. 95; no. 6; pp. 1254 - 1262
Main Authors Kent, Laura, Tang-Martínez, Zuleyma
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Oxford American Society of Mammalogists 01.12.2014
Allen Press Publishing Services
Oxford University Press
Subjects
Anal glands
Animal behavior
Carnivores
chemical composition
Chemicals
Dens
Discrimination
FEATURE ARTICLES
Feces
Gas chromatography
Gender discrimination
home range
individual odors
Male animals
Males
Mammalogy
odor discrimination
Odors
Olfaction
outdoor enclosures
Procyon lotor
raccoon
Secretion
smell
Social discrimination
social structure
Studies
Urine
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Summary:Although raccoons (Procyon lotor) were originally categorized as solitary carnivores, recent evidence shows that some raccoons have overlapping home ranges, travel in groups, and share dens. Moreover, raccoons use communal latrines and scent mark, suggesting that chemical signals may be important for communication. Using a familiarization–discrimination technique we investigated whether raccoons can discriminate individual differences in the odors of conspecific urine or feces. The subjects were wild caught (n = 10 raccoons for urine experiments; n = 8 raccoons for feces experiments) and tested in a large outdoor enclosure. We demonstrated that raccoons can distinguish individual differences in the odor of unfamiliar and unrelated conspecific urine, but not in the odor of feces. Gas chromatography was also done on the urine samples to look for chemical differences. The gas chromatograms showed visible differences and qualitative as well as quantitative differences in chemical composition. This is the 1st study to determine that raccoons can distinguish individual differences in chemosensory cues. This opens the door to future research on the role of olfaction in raccoon social organization.
Bibliography:http://dx.doi.org/10.1644%2F14-MAMM-A-009
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ISSN:0022-2372
1545-1542
1545-1542
DOI:10.1644/14-MAMM-A-009