Prairie dogs ‘kiss and cuddle more when they have an audience’
By ANITuesday, February 15, 2011
LONDON - A new study has revealed that adult prairie dogs kiss and cuddle each other more when they are being watched.
Adam Eltorai from Washington University in St. Louis and his colleagues studied 25 black-tailed prairie dogs at Saint Louis Zoo in Missouri and found that the animals enjoy receiving attention just as much as humans do, reports the Daily Mail.
They found that the larger the crowd watching them, the more prairie dogs kissed.
“In many situations, prairie dogs react to being watched in exactly the same way we would expect humans to react,” Eltorai told the BBC.
“When more people were watching, the adult prairie dogs became much more affectionate, kissing and touching more and fighting less,” he added.
Prairie dogs have a similar style of greeting as many humans, touching their lips together and even sometimes making contact with their tongues.
And the kissing is often accompanied by other affectionate behaviours, such as cuddling or grooming one another.
The findings come after recent research was released showing that prairie dogs ‘talk’ to each other and can describe what different human beings look like. (ANI)
