THE HONEY-GUIDES 49 



of symbionts met with at one time is not of great importance. This 

 would seem to apply to baboons, which are gregarious animals, 

 although in the one described instance of baboon and honey-guide 

 coincidence at a bees' nest, only one out of a small group of the apes 

 was actually involved at the hive. 



The imitative actions of the native African human when trying to 

 attract the attention of a honey-guide are apparently designed to 

 increase his potential valence. He grunts in the manner of a ratel 

 and chops on trees to imitate the sound of opening a bees' nest. 

 Since the valence of the symbiont depends on the condition and the 

 "interests" of the honey-guide, it follows that in areas where the 

 species has given up guiding behavior either its needs are satisfied 

 more simply and directly, or else these objects — ratel, baboon, and 

 human, as the case may be — have lost their valence. The two possi- 

 bilities may be merely different aspects of a single change or they 

 may be separate factors; at present no one can venture to say which. 

 The valance of the objects is judged by their ability to get and to 

 hold the attention of the bird, to elicit from it the needed behavioral 

 response. This does not depend on the responsiveness of the object, 

 although active responsiveness may help to bring out the behavior 

 pattern of the bird. As stated below (p. 59), honey-guides have been 

 recorded as following nonresponding humans for as much as 5 miles 

 without ceasing their "guiding-luring" behavior. We have so little 

 real knowledge of ratel s and baboons as symbionts of the honey-guide 

 that we cannot even guess the relative valence of these animals and 

 the African human. We can only treat the three of them together 

 as being similar in this regard, although we should keep in mind 

 Russell's (1935) remarks that "in the case where an animal responds 

 in like manner to a considerable range of objects, which are accordingly 

 equi-valent functionally, it by no means follows that the objects look 

 alike to the animal, or are indistinguishable by it. They are treated 

 alike as having the same or similar functional value, similar valence, 

 but for all that they may be easily distinguishable inter se." 



When the African native became aware of the fact that by following 

 a greater honey-guide he would be brought to a source of honey, he 

 quickly improved upon his opportunity by actively and deliberately 

 seeking out the bird rather than passively waiting for it to come his 

 way and lead him. As far as we know, none of the other symbionts 

 of the bird do this, although it should be emphasized that they may 

 well do so. That the bird may regularly take the initiative in such 

 matters is suggested by the case of a honey-guide attempting to 

 attract an unresponsive mongoose to follow it, and also by the very 

 large number of instances in which an unsolicited bird has come to a 

 human and begun to "guide" him. When the bird comes of its own 



