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Chem. Senses 28: 381-388, 2003
© Oxford University Press 2003

Possible Coding for Recognition of Sexes, Individuals and Species in Anal Gland Volatiles of Mustela eversmanni and M. sibirica

Jian-Xu Zhang1,4, Jia Ni2, Xue-Jie Ren2, Lixing Sun3, Zhi-Bin Zhang1 and Zu-Wang Wang1

1 State Key Laboratory of Integrated Management of Pest Insects and Rodents in Agriculture, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100080 2 Department of Biology, Capital Normal University, Beijing 100083, China 3 Department of Biological Sciences, Central Washington University, Ellensburg, Washington, WA 98926-7537, USA 4 Present address: Department of Chemistry, Institute for Pheromone Research, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA

Correspondence to be sent to: Zhi-Bin Zhang, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100080, China. e-mail: zhangzb{at}panda.ioz.ac.cn

With a combination of solvent extraction and gas chromatography—mass spectrometry, we found eight new compounds in the two sympatric Mustela species, M. eversmanni and M. sibirica. These compounds had not been detected by headspace sampling with solvent desorption. Two of the newly detected compounds are nitrogen-containing compounds, indole and o-aminoacetophenone and the remaining are sulfur-containing volatiles. By comparing same and opposite sexes between the two Mustela species, we found that qualitative differences in the anal gland secretion are most likely to be used to code for information about species, corresponding to the idea of digital coding. In the Siberian weasel (M. sibirica), both presence or absence of sex-specific compounds (Z-2-ethyl-3-methylthietane only in females) and relative abundance of some compounds between males and females could be used to code for information about sex, corresponding to the idea of digital and analog coding, respectively. In the steppe polecat (M. eversmanni), only quantitative differences provided the possibility for inter-sexual communication. Thus coding for information about sex appeared to be digital. Coding for individual information could also be either digital or analog or both through the presence or absence of certain compounds and/or the difference in the relative abundances of certain compounds among individuals. Comparing with other Mustela spp., we failed to find a congruence between the chemical composition of anal gland secretions and the phylogenetic relationship among the species in this genus.

Key words: anal gland secretion, volatile compounds, Siberian weasel, Mustela sibirica, steppe polecat, Mustela eversmanni


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