Prairie Dogs: America's Meerkats - Language
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 พ.ค. 2011
- This program discusses Prairie Dog Language -- the most sophisticated animal language decoded so far. Con Slobodchikoff, Ph.D., and his students at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, researched the Gunnison's prairie dogs Alarm Calls for over 30 years to decode their language. Sonograms of all 5 species of prairie dogs suggest that they would not understand each other and each species has their own language. Each species also has Regional and Local Dialects.
There are 5 species of prairie dogs; the Black-tailed prairie dogs and the Mexican prairie dogs are the black-tailed group who have black tail tips, and the Gunnison's prairie dogs, the White-tailed prairie dogs, and the Utah prairie dogs are the white-tailed group who have white tail tips.
All prairie dogs live in the grasslands of western central North America, and all are social. They live in relative harmony within their social groups. All of the species are similar in their social behavior, although the black-tails are somewhat more social than the white-tails. Learn about a type of hibernation called Torpor that prairie dogs employ. See pups before they emerge from their natal burrows as well as in different stages of life (an average prairie dog lives 3-4 years), rare above ground mating, a lot of greet-kissing, territorial behavior from fighting and aggressive chases to social structure based on plant food sources on each territory, mutual grooming, and prairie dog personalities!
Prairie dogs are considered Keystone Species of their grassland ecosystems -- some 200 vertebrate species and a number of invertebrate species of animals depend on them for food or for their burrows. Prairie dogs survive in 1-2% of their historic range of habitat. Their numbers have declined drastically over the past 100 years to 1-2% of the number of animals there were historically. Agriculture, land development, target shooting and disease are the primary reasons for their continuing decline.
The Mexican prairie dogs are listed as Endangered (under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species -- CITES, as well as recognized by the Mexican government as at high risk of extinction), but are still being killed primarily for agricultural land interests. The Utah prairie dogs are listed as Threatened (under the United States' Endangered Species Act -- ESA), but they are being killed due to land development. The other three species need to be listed also in order to have some protection under the law. The Gunnison's prairie dogs are currently under review for listing under the ESA.
A number of prairie animals are at risk of extinction (as well as prairie dogs themselves) because prairie dog numbers are so low. Five animals that are dependent on prairie dogs and are at highest risk are Black-Footed Ferrets, Swift Foxes, Mountain Plovers, Burrowing Owls and Ferruginous Hawks.
walking through a field minding my own business the other day when I hear a prairie dog call me fat and say my shirt looked stupid. my mother bought be that shirt.. Mr.prairie dog
😹😹that's hilarious
At least your heckler was a male.
My confidence has never been in the pits… until that one day. I'm still not comfortable repeating the words of my… abusive rat!
She's not next to you… is she?
Just checking.
I wonder if they have distinct enough voices that one might freak out at hearing their own voice played back to them, or think it was weird that the voice of the guy sitting quietly next to them was coming from the distance.
I will learn their language and become their king!
Actually, that's very interesting. I wonder how experiments to communicate in this decoded language may work. Whatever, please don't become their trump.
What if you found out they had All the answers? Lol
@@englishlanguagewithnina5965 "i need to know"
"chirp chirp"
"MORE, TELL ME MORE"
"chirp chirp chiirp!"
"apologies for my indecency, i simply got too excited"
@@PG-wz7by Get over Pres. Trump and your "Trump Derangement Syndrome" Go lick bidens'toes... Sniff his hair while you're at it😉
8 years later, g gg gGuy’s i i I over heard them them them them t t tt talking about k k kk kk k killing all human’s 😳
I have had prairie dogs as pets for about 15 years now ... my newest ones are only about 2 years old .. but each morning ... I come out of my bedroom and my male sees me and I say 'good morning' and he does the 'jump yip' and then I mimic him best I can and he mimics back ... our record is him repeating me 7 times in a row .. I think he gets bored mimicking me or I don't hit the right notes after that many times ... anyway its our good morning to each other that I love.
This research on prairie dogs is one of the most important discoveries in linguistics and the harmonic structure of language.
Color Wheel Music Theory and
And it is amazing that humans realize we are not the only animals with languages, we can now realize that language isn't what makes us unique, we can realize that there probably a lot more communication complexities with other animals that may be as, or more complex than, our own
@@daniellewilson8527 i suggest you to read Vygotsky its very interesting
@@daniellewilson8527 Same story with tool use, culture, and probably more to come.
@@daniellewilson8527
A prairie dog couple recently bought my house. They're renovating the basement, and they just built a pool!
I think the chatter vocalization might be a sort of "checking in" call. It could be a question "Are you there" with a reply being "I am here" or it might even be an announcement "I am here" with another prairie dog acknowledging it's presence.
This is both fascinating and adorable. Nice combination.
The Jumping Yip is the cutest damn thing I have ever seen!
I have two female prairie dogs as pets and my guess from what I learned is that mine probably do not have a language. They never learned. Their's are probably baby talk. They do how ever exhibit certain behavior with their calls. The warning chirps mine make let's me know they are not in the mood for company and will actually be a bit aggressive. Their stand up and call sound lets me know they are happy to see me and will be super cuddly and affectionate. They also make that call when I sneeze, cough, and crack open a beer. All I know is they when they chirp, give them their space, when they stand up and call then go pick them up and get some lovin!!!!
Haha the sneeze sounds like a that little howl / jump yip they do. I miss my prairie dog
I'm 11 years late but this is absolutely fascinating
excellent, important work. I always thought that it was irrational (and arrogant) that humans would think that other species, who share similar anatomical features, do not have language. Can't wait to read Chasing Doctor Dolittle
I saw a prairie dog run up to a rabbit that was in their colony, do the jump yip, and then run back to its hole. The rabbit did not move the whole time. Interesting if it was a territorial dispute.
It makes me wonder if differing dialects can eventually understand each other. Like if two prairie dogs from different colonies got together, and seeing multiple predators of the same species/description) eventually learn the language of their colleague. Or even form their own dialect due to the mash-up. This shit is fascinating and so exciting that we've only scratched the tip of the iceberg on this.
What adorable creatures they are, and it is so good how this scientist has used his mind to venture towards the specifics of their communication.
How exciting what we know -& also what we don't know!
WoW they have a full language. Excellent work.
Incredible work and discovery. I couldn't even priorly conceive that their random yipping was anything past contextual grunts. Interesting AND adorable!
What's odd is I had a guinea pig do this exact same thing a few years ago. I had initially seen the segment on discovery. It wasn't until a year or so later I was talking with my mother, leaving him in her care for a weekend while I went camping. He did almost the exact same jump-yip sound as these prairie dogs. First and only time I heard him do it, but we both heard it and still have no idea what it means. On occasion I've heard other guinea pig owners comment they've heard Guineas do a bird whistle call rarely, maybe once or twice during the pigs lifetime. I had another pig, heard him doing that seemingly randomly, only once. Initially thinking how on earth did a bird get into my living room. But it wasn't coming from the guinea enclosure. Otherwise I only ever heard their usual chattering, rumbling and calls for food. Still a mystery.
One of my guinea pigs started chirping a few years ago when my parents were watching a very loud movie downstairs. I'm entirely on board the "chirping is a panic response that's less panicky than playing dead" hypothesis.
I watched this a few years ago when I was staying in Cedar Crest, NM on the mountain above Albuquerque where there were a few colonies of prairie dogs. I was entranced by them and their flittle communities. Thank you for sharing this video and making your research so accessible to lay people!
Oh my goodness! This is amazing. I grew up with a squirrel monkey for 13 years. She definitely understood our language and we understood what her chirps and skwaks were all about. She had different chirps for greetings for each family member, for when she wanted our food, and so much more.
Animals are so amazing. I hate hearing how humans are supposedly better than animals. No we aren't. We are just different.
I am an Australian living in Singapore, so therefore have never known anything about Prairie Dogs other than that they exist. Found this video fascinating & thanks for your painstaking research into this field.
The people conducting this research are geniuses
Very good work Mr. Slobodchikoff. I hope this research will make more humans appreciate this species and refrain from using high-powered rifles to obliterate them.
The Kirk so
The topic on animal consciousness is profoundly fascinating but it raises all sorts of ethical issues which most people (myself include) try not to think about. If we did like to think about them, most of us would probably feel like monsters most of the time and nothing would get done. I worry that by the time humanity understands (let alone accepts the existence of) animal consciousness there won't be many creatures left (at least ones that exist in a natural habitat) to share these experiences with, like having a prairie dog call me fat and a poor dresser.
@The Kirk. I share your hope. Also that this knowledge will bring more balance to humans' perception of the world and put the brakes on our wholesale destruction of all species.
It wouldn't change the havoc they cause lol, the reasons for getting rid of infestations would still be present
sick a=holes with guns think it's great sport to slaughter tiny animals to prove what great hunters they are
Since moving to the plains prairie dogs have quickly become my favorite animal. Love these little guys
Holy crap. This is so fascinating! Watching this video made my day - I very much enjoyed learning about prairie dog language.
This is absolutely amazing! Thank you so much for uploading this video!
The jump yip is adorable!
This was excellent, thank you. I have your book and can't wait to read it.
Fascinating video, thank you so much for sharing! Greetings from Mexico
I really hope you guys are doing more studies with other animals! It's amazing to learn about this. Great job!! 👏 👏 👏
Doesn't surprise me at all! Great research!
I can testify that they still haven't created a call for "dude with stick that goes bang".
This is so interesting. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing this video :) All the best!
Fascinating!
love these adorable creatures. large groups of them live near my parent's home in colorado.
Amazing work !
Hello, I love this video and frequently use it in my lectures. Would it be possible to add closed captions to it, to enhance accessibility? I am happy to write these up, but am not able to upload them with the current video settings. Thanks!
Very cool. Thank you.
This is amazing and very interesting!!!
This is amazing
Outstanding.
MIND BLOWN
wow thats very interesting and here I thought it was birds chipping when I was living in Ramah, NM(a small Navajo Reservation) theres bunch of those guys runnin around but then again they're crazy cause they like to run across the road a second before a car passes by to see if they got across, drop down before getting hit or they got run over for bein dumb. On the Gila River reservation in AZ, there are prairie dogs that are smaller and run in straight lines to burrows, they sound different too.
This is so cool!!
So cute!
They're my favorite🤗💕
Very interesting video. Thanks.
The little prairie dogs are sooo cute
amazing...
amazing!!
AWWW THE JUMP YIP CALL IS SO CUTE 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭
This stuck with me a few days
Amazing comm skills 😮
I hope I'm not repeating this. I've typed it once lol maybe didn't summit it. I live in Texas. I work for TXDOT I know a huge dog town that is on both sides of the road. This town gets closer every month or two to the edge of the road. It would be great that someone look at them studies them before the hunters come in. Thanks
thanks
Hurray! It's a wonderful day!
so cute
Fascinating work!!
This is incredibly interesting.
Also does that mean a prairie dog can call me fat?
I bet they kept saying it’s that fat bitch again every time I walked past a colony when I first started weight loss
Whoa, someone's touchy!
Maybe I wasn’t paying attention but did they ever talk about the reactions to the calls
It would appear that there is a trend in threat level and frequency of the yips. Although, I am unsure why a hawk would be a single yip. Perhaps because a hawk inst much of a major threat? Sure it can easily swoop away a single prairie dog but that is nothing compared to a land predators ability to munch them down like hotcakes.
tannershadow1 hawks are actually the biggest danger and can strike more quickly than other predators. my uneducated guess would be that hawks are of the hugest threat level and notifications of their presence must be swift and therefore more straight to the point. not to mention that hawks do not differ between themselves so less information is needed to get the point across in the call
Damstraight68
Hmm, That is interesting. Come to think of it they would hide in their holes the moment they saw a land predator coming. Which most land predators wouldn't have much of a chance of breaching their defenses. So it would make sense that they would need to be quick with their language while communicating that there is a bird of prey coming, in order to hide quickly. This would mean that humans were not perceived as a major threat. Which I suppose is a good thing?
***** .. It is possible they don't see us as threats but I think that would be subjective to the group in question. Rather, I think the tactility of a bird being able to swoop down as opposed to a land mammal having to approach the burrow from the land may have something to do with it. The Hawk can attack much more swiftly and without notice.
Perhaps the single sound mimics the single sound hawks make.
In two other videos the prairie dogs did the "yip-jump."
1) When several were ganging up on a snake to drive it away. ["Prairie Dog Snake Alarm | American Serengeti"]
th-cam.com/video/icaGIeOY9gc/w-d-xo.html
2) When 1 prairie dog mom alone was luring the snake away from her babies.
["Brave Prairie Dog Confronts Snake | North America"]
th-cam.com/video/p0ZG8YpQAUA/w-d-xo.html
MIND... BLOWN... :D
Yet more proof that those other sentient beings with which we share this planet should and must be respected as brothers of the earth and not "just animals". Rats too have been found to be more intelligent that we have known before. Its about time human animals started treating all sentient beings with more respect.!xx
This is really astonishing !
I sold them as pets. Just live with one for a while, easy to recognize. Most common bark was all clear 👍
Prairie Dog said I was misshapen and had terrible fashion sense so all of them hide away from me.
The jump yip means "so long and thanks for all the fish."
Now I know where the leaks from the Whitehouse are coming from
This is funny :)
I wonder if you could introduce a prairie dog from a distant community (with a microphone strapped on) to see what sort of alarm response it would receive. There might even be a language lesson for the newcomer...
Lol amazing work :)
Omg like awwwe!!! The tiny little f*cks 🥺🙏🏼💕
They are so damn cute!!! I want 100!
I will now incorporate jump-yips in my daily life.
Amazing, but not surprising.
I "didn't never" heard about Nim Chimpsky - I READ about him. And I'm pretty sure he didn't die of a broken adult male red deer (a hart).
Ladies and gentlemen: our future rulers.
the implications of this are just fantastically mind-blowing.
grammatical structures embedded in single chirps! haha! makes us seem so basic!
Is it possible the random chatters are in fact a "name" or role call?
Question: As I have read, prairie dogs live in underground burrows - now, doesn't that restrict somehow their color vision?
No, because most of their daily activity is above ground, outside the burrows.
The video mentions that they can't see the color red.
I gotta catch 'em all, just like Pokemon!
Wow this is amazing
How long until The Oatmeal falls in love with these dudes?
This is fascinating. I hope you will continue to uncover the mysteries of animal communications. I have noticed that when you walk in a forest, a short repeated call is almost universal among species to alert of an intruder (in this case is myself). I have, on many occasions, heard that sudden repeated call alarming of danger by various species of birds. So, there is a cross-species communication but it is regional. And birds migrate over long distances, so it is "universal".
Those killer whales are called Lolita and Hugo, by the way. :D
wow
hooray it's a wonderful day!
That's what she said
Cool study, do one for dogs next. :)
Has this research been peer-reviewed?
amazing
*chatter chatter chatter* Are you alright, honey?
*chatter chatter chatter* Yes, I'm alright, dear.
A lot of rodents have similar language squirrels are kind of close to this.
That's pretty crazy XD
This is astonishing.
cute
Squirrels are inteligent animals
Must be a bad day if a prairie dog calls you fat
Soon we'll be able to understand big ounce