Adopted baby fruit bats behave like their adoptive mothers

 

https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/935092

 

 News Release 16-Nov-2021
Peer-Reviewed Publication
Tel-Aviv University

 

Bat researchers at Tel Aviv University conducted a cross-adoption experiment: pups of urban fruit bats were adopted by rural mothers and vice versa, in order to discover whether the relative boldness of city bats is a genetic or acquired trait. The findings indicate that the pups behave like their adoptive, rather than biological, mothers. Pups born in the country but adopted by urban mothers tend to be bolder and take more risks than those born in the city but adopted by rural mothers. Prof. Yovel: "We wanted to find out whether boldness is transferred genetically or learned somehow from the mother. Our findings suggest that this trait is passed on to pups by the mothers that nurse and raise them, even when they are not their biological mothers."

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