Animal Behavior Extra Credit by Wyatt Collier

The World’s Smallest Monkey: the Pygmy Marmoset

wyattcollier55 — 2025-02-04 02:20:50 UTC

If captured, the Pygmy marmoset can cling onto the finger of a person the way a koala might hang onto a tree. Marmosets are often born in pairs, nursed by their mothers, carried around but their fathers, and watched over their siblings. They live in family groups of around half a dozen until the younger adults venture out to find a mate. Different groups have distinct dialects, with trills varying by length and frequency. Infant Pygmy marmosets babble the way human babies do, both to get their parents’ attention and to learn the group dialect. While the Pygmy’s don’t usually eat fruit (they eat the sticky resin found in tree bark), but they do hunt insects, and as they forage together, they chatter to each other through the trees. Their chatter sounds like a brief, high-pitched alarm whistle, and is often more shrill when they communicate across distances.

Prairie Voles (picture A)

wyattcollier55 — 2025-02-04 02:27:58 UTC

Male and female prairie voles in some populations form long-term relationships, pairing off as couples that lives together, with both parents caring for offspring

Potential gene affecting male behavior with young and females

wyattcollier55 — 2025-02-04 02:40:52 UTC

In an experiment, male prairie voles, exhibit elevated levels of affiliative behavior after vasopressin is administered directly into the brain. Males that received added copied of the avpr1a gene in the ventral pallidum spent significantly more time with a familiar female versus with an unfamiliar one, when given a choice over a 3-hour trial. I was curious if the Pygmy marmoset has a similar set of genes and receptors as the prairie voles that contributes to it being monogamous and caring for their young.