Remote islands as natural laboratories: human–food association increases attraction to humans and novelty exploration in a seabird

Abstract

Increased attraction to humans and their objects often arises after repeated and positive human–wildlife encounters (e.g. food provided in tourist settings). The causes of this ‘over-attraction’, which may result from a learned association between humans and food, are still poorly studied in wild animals. Understanding the influence of humans on animals’ responses is yet crucial to prevent negative effects (e.g. aggression). We presented three novel objects to two groups of free-ranging brown skuas ( Catharacta antarctica ssp. lonnbergi ) in the remote sub-Antarctic, where their habitats show no or minimal human disturbance. Skuas in one group (Verte) had previously participated in repeated food-rewarded behavioural and cognitive tasks with a human experimenter; skuas in the other group (Ratmanoff) had never done so. Objects consisted of (i) one natural-food-resembling object (plastic fish), (ii) one anthropogenic food object (real cake slice), and (iii) one anthropogenic non-food object (yellow glove). Verte group skuas approached the human experimenter and pecked significantly more and sooner at novel objects. Human–food association may have thus resulted in increased attraction to humans and novelty exploration in previously naive brown skuas, making this species a useful model for investigating the consequences of experience with humans on wildlife behaviour.