How is a cricket like a rat? Insights from the application of cybernetics to evasive food protective behaviour

Robbing and dodging is a well-documented food protective behaviour in rats. Recently, we demonstrated that a simple cybernetic rule, gaining and maintaining a preferred interanimal distance, can account for much of the variability in dodging by rats. In this paper, the field cricket, Teleogryllus oceanicus, was used to test whether or not the same or similar cybernetic rules are used by animals of different lineages and body plans. Pairs of female crickets were tested in a circular arena with a clear glass surface. A small food pellet was given to one of the crickets and the attempts to rob the food by the other were videotaped from beneath. The results show that, although crickets, unlike rats, use a variety of defensive strategies, all of the cases in which they use evasion to protect a portable food item conform to the same cybernetic rules used by rats.

► We test whether crickets use the same cybernetic rule as rats to protect food.
► We analysed female field crickets protecting portable food items from other crickets.
► Crickets show more behavioural variability than rats.
► Despite this, crickets use the same cybernetic rule used by rats to protect food.