This study describes the use of warrens and aspects of the social organisation
of a population of the burrowing bettong, an endangered potoroid. Observations
were made on 14 animals, maintained in a 4-ha enclosure of natural vegetation
at Shark Bay, Western Australia. The population divided into three social
groups, each of one male and one to many females. Individual bettongs used
1–10 warrens over a period of five months. Males changed warrens more
often than females. Some females regularly shared warrens with other females.
Many of these associations appeared to be mothers with their daughter or
daughters. Sharing of warrens occurred regularly until the daughters were
about 10 months old and occasionally after that. Day ranges of males were
larger than those of females, exclusive of other males, and overlapped those
of 1–6 females. Males shared warrens with the females within their day
range. At night bettongs were not constrained to their day range and made use
of the whole enclosure. Equal numbers of agonistic interactions between and
within day-range groups, as well as the absence of feeding associations,
indicated that bettongs operated independently of their day-range groups at
night while feeding. Bettongs formed a weak dominance hierarchy with the
oldest female on top and a young male at the bottom. Male–male
interactions tended to be more aggressive than male–female interactions.
Males were involved in significantly more agonistic interactions, particularly
chases, than were females; chases usually entailed chasing another male away
from a female. Use of space and social behaviour suggested a polygynous mating
system.
Iterated weak dominance and interval-dominance supermodular games
