How cooperatively breeding birds identify relatives and avoid incest: New insights into dispersal and kin recognition

BioEssays ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 37 (12) ◽  
pp. 1303-1308 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Riehl ◽  
Caitlin A. Stern
Keyword(s):  
Kin Recognition ◽  
Breeding Birds ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding

scholarly journals Sex Allocation Patterns across Cooperatively Breeding Birds Do Not Support Predictions of the Repayment Hypothesis

2017 ◽  
Vol 190 (4) ◽  
pp. 547-556 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nyil Khwaja ◽  
Ben J. Hatchwell ◽  
Robert P. Freckleton ◽  
Jonathan P. Green
Keyword(s):  
Sex Allocation ◽  
Breeding Birds ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding ◽  
Allocation Patterns

Coupling Delayed Breeding with Short-distance Dispersal in Cooperatively Breeding Birds

Ethology ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 86 (4) ◽  
pp. 265-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steve Zack
Keyword(s):  
Short Distance ◽  
Breeding Birds ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding

scholarly journals Cooperatively breeding banded mongooses do not avoid inbreeding through familiarity-based kin recognition

2021 ◽  
Vol 75 (9) ◽  
Author(s):  
Monil Khera ◽  
Kevin Arbuckle ◽  
Joseph I. Hoffman ◽  
Jennifer L. Sanderson ◽  
Michael A. Cant ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Kin Recognition ◽  
Group Living ◽  
Inbreeding Avoidance ◽  
Breeding Systems ◽  
Direct Care ◽  
Age Classes ◽  
Communal Breeding ◽  
Phenotype Matching ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding ◽  
The Right

Abstract In species that live in family groups, such as cooperative breeders, inbreeding is usually avoided through the recognition of familiar kin. For example, individuals may avoid mating with conspecifics encountered regularly in infancy, as these likely include parents, siblings, and closely related alloparents. Other mechanisms have also been reported, albeit rarely; for example, individuals may compare their own phenotype to that of others, with close matches representing likely relatives (“phenotype matching”). However, determinants of the primary inbreeding avoidance mechanisms used by a given species remain poorly understood. We use 24 years of life history and genetic data to investigate inbreeding avoidance in wild cooperatively breeding banded mongooses (Mungos mungo). We find that inbreeding avoidance occurs within social groups but is far from maximised (mean pedigree relatedness between 351 breeding pairs = 0.144). Unusually for a group-living vertebrate, we find no evidence that females avoid breeding with males with which they are familiar in early life. This is probably explained by communal breeding; females give birth in tight synchrony and pups are cared for communally, thus reducing the reliability of familiarity-based proxies of relatedness. We also found little evidence that inbreeding is avoided by preferentially breeding with males of specific age classes. Instead, females may exploit as-yet unknown proxies of relatedness, for example, through phenotype matching, or may employ postcopulatory inbreeding avoidance mechanisms. Investigation of species with unusual breeding systems helps to identify constraints against inbreeding avoidance and contributes to our understanding of the distribution of inbreeding across species. Significance statement Choosing the right mate is never easy, but it may be particularly difficult for banded mongooses. In most social animals, individuals avoid mating with those that were familiar to them as infants, as these are likely to be relatives. However, we show that this rule does not work in banded mongooses. Here, the offspring of several mothers are raised in large communal litters by their social group, and parents seem unable to identify or direct care towards their own pups. This may make it difficult to recognise relatives based on their level of familiarity and is likely to explain why banded mongooses frequently inbreed. Nevertheless, inbreeding is lower than expected if mates are chosen at random, suggesting that alternative pre- or post-copulatory inbreeding avoidance mechanisms are used.

EVOLUTION OF HELPING BEHAVIOR IN COOPERATIVELY BREEDING BIRDS

1998 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 141-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Cockburn
Keyword(s):  
Helping Behavior ◽  
Breeding Birds ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding

scholarly journals Nest predation predicts infanticide in a cooperatively breeding bird

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (8) ◽  
pp. 20190314
Author(s):  
Yi-Ru Cheng ◽  
Dustin R. Rubenstein ◽  
Sheng-Feng Shen
Keyword(s):  
Nest Predation ◽  
Social Conflict ◽  
Alternative Hypothesis ◽  
Group Living ◽  
Breeding Birds ◽  
Breeding Bird ◽  
Parental Response ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding ◽  
Alternative Hypotheses ◽  
Living Species

In cooperatively breeding species, social conflict is typically assumed to underlie destructive behaviours like infanticide. However, an untested alternative hypothesis in birds is that infanticide in the form of egg tossing may simply be a parental response to partial nest predation representing a life-history trade-off. We examined egg tossing behaviour in the colonial and cooperatively breeding grey-capped social weaver ( Pseudonigrita arnaudi ), a plural breeder in which pairs nest separately, often in the same tree. Using infrared nest cameras, we found that 78% of the tossing events from 2012 to 2017 were committed by parents, suggesting that social conflict is unlikely to be the main reason underlying egg tossing in this species. Instead, reductions in clutch size due to both natural and experimentally simulated predation induced parental egg tossing. Our study suggests that destructive behaviour in cooperatively breeding birds can be shaped by a variety of mechanisms beyond social conflict and that alternative hypotheses must be considered when studying the adaptive significance of infanticide in group-living species.

scholarly journals Kin discrimination via odour in the cooperatively breeding banded mongoose

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 171798 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Mitchell ◽  
S. Kyabulima ◽  
R. Businge ◽  
M. A. Cant ◽  
H. J. Nichols
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Relatedness ◽  
Wild Population ◽  
Kin Recognition ◽  
Group Living ◽  
Olfactory Cues ◽  
Kin Discrimination ◽  
Phenotype Matching ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding ◽  
Banded Mongoose ◽  
Mungos Mungo

Kin discrimination is often beneficial for group-living animals as it aids in inbreeding avoidance and providing nepotistic help. In mammals, the use of olfactory cues in kin discrimination is widespread and may occur through learning the scents of individuals that are likely to be relatives, or by assessing genetic relatedness directly through assessing odour similarity (phenotype matching). We use scent presentations to investigate these possibilities in a wild population of the banded mongoose Mungos mungo , a cooperative breeder in which inbreeding risk is high and females breed communally, disrupting behavioural cues to kinship. We find that adults show heightened behavioural responses to unfamiliar (extra-group) scents than to familiar (within-group) scents. Interestingly, we found that responses to familiar odours, but not unfamiliar odours, varied with relatedness. This suggests that banded mongooses are either able to use an effective behavioural rule to identify likely relatives from within their group, or that phenotype matching is used in the context of within-group kin recognition but not extra-group kin recognition. In other cooperative breeders, familiarity is used within the group and phenotype matching may be used to identify unfamiliar kin. However, for the banded mongoose this pattern may be reversed, most likely due to their unusual breeding system which disrupts within-group behavioural cues to kinship.

scholarly journals Can we measure the benefits of help in cooperatively breeding birds: the case of superb fairy-wrens Malurus cyaneus?

2008 ◽  
Vol 77 (3) ◽  
pp. 430-438 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Cockburn ◽  
Rachel A. Sims ◽  
Helen L. Osmond ◽  
David J. Green ◽  
Michael C. Double ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Breeding Birds ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding ◽  
Malurus Cyaneus

Reduced Egg Investment Can Conceal Helper Effects in Cooperatively Breeding Birds

Science ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 317 (5840) ◽  
pp. 941-944 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. F. Russell ◽  
N. E. Langmore ◽  
A. Cockburn ◽  
L. B. Astheimer ◽  
R. M. Kilner
Keyword(s):  
Breeding Birds ◽  
Cooperatively Breeding
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