Flexible parents: joint effects of handicapping and brood size manipulation on female parental care in
            Nicrophorus vespilloides

The differential allocation hypothesis posits that individuals should invest in the current reproductive attempt according to the attractiveness of their mate, but studies of allocation by males when female traits are manipulated to be more attractive are lacking. In the current study, we experimentally enhanced and reduced the plumage brightness of female tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) relative to controls to examine whether males adjust investment in parental care according to female attractiveness, while simultaneously performing a brood size manipulation. Contrary to our predictions, we found no evidence that males provisioned nestlings according to the plumage brightness of females. However, we found that nestling quality and fledging success were lowest when female plumage brightness was reduced and brood size was enlarged. This may be due to the plumage brightness treatment influencing agonistic interactions with other females, and may suggest that plumage brightness is a signal assessed by females.

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Brood size manipulation reveals cost on the size of the second clutch in the earwig Anisolabis maritime

Behaviour ◽

10.1163/1568539x-bja10121 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-11

Author(s):

Seizi Suzuki

Keyword(s):

Reproductive Success ◽

Parental Care ◽

Clutch Size ◽

Maternal Care ◽

Brood Size ◽

Trade Off ◽

Brood Size Manipulation ◽

Second Clutch ◽

The Cost

Abstract There may be a trade-off between the duration of parental care and future reproductive success. Traditionally, studies about the cost of parental care have included the removal of the parent. However, producing a secondary clutch after the failure of the first one is a compensatory behaviour that occurs in cases of brood failure. In this study, attempts were made to detect the cost of maternal care in the earwig, Anisolabis maritima (Dermaptera: Anisolabididae) by either extending the period of care or increasing the brood size to prevent compensation through the brood’s success. The results indicated that manipulation did not change the inter-clutch interval, although my previous study revealed shortening of these intervals after the removal of the clutch in this species. In this study, decreased clutch size manipulation increased the size of the following clutch.

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Parental Care in a Stressful World: Experimentally Elevated Cortisol and Brood Size Manipulation Influence Nest Success Probability and Nest-Tending Behavior in a Wild Teleost Fish

Physiological and Biochemical Zoology ◽

10.1086/689678 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 90 (1) ◽

pp. 85-95 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Dirk A. Algera ◽

Lee F. G. Gutowsky ◽

Aaron J. Zolderdo ◽

Steven J. Cooke

Keyword(s):

Parental Care ◽

Teleost Fish ◽

Brood Size ◽

Nest Success ◽

Success Probability ◽

Brood Size Manipulation

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Offspring telomere length in the long lived Alpine swift is negatively related to the age of their biological father and foster mother

Biology Letters ◽

10.1098/rsbl.2017.0188 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 13 (9) ◽

pp. 20170188 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

François Criscuolo ◽

Sandrine Zahn ◽

Pierre Bize

Keyword(s):

Parental Care ◽

Telomere Length ◽

Brood Size ◽

Foster Parents ◽

Growth Conditions ◽

Early Growth ◽

Foster Mother ◽

Biological Father ◽

Accumulation Of Damage ◽

Older Males

A growing body of studies is showing that offspring telomere length (TL) can be influenced by the age of their parents. Such a relationship might be explained by variation in TL at conception (gamete effect) and/or by alteration of early growth conditions in species providing parental care. In a long-lived bird with bi-parental care, the Alpine swift ( Apus melba ), we exchanged an uneven number of 2 to 4-day-old nestlings between pairs as part of a brood size manipulation. Nestling TL was measured at 50 days after hatching, which allowed investigation of the influence of the age of both their biological and foster parents on offspring TL, after controlling for the manipulation. Nestling TL was negatively related to the age of their biological father and foster mother. Nestling TL did not differ between enlarged and reduced broods. These findings suggest that offspring from older males were fertilized by gametes with shorter telomeres, presumably due to a greater cell division history or a longer accumulation of damage, and that older females may have provided poorer parental care to their offspring.

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Parental effects alter the adaptive value of an adult behavioural trait

eLife ◽

10.7554/elife.07340 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 4 ◽

Cited By ~ 19

Author(s):

Rebecca M Kilner ◽

Giuseppe Boncoraglio ◽

Jonathan M Henshaw ◽

Benjamin JM Jarrett ◽

Ornela De Gasperin ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Parental Care ◽

Theoretical Modelling ◽

Parental Effects ◽

Levels Of Care ◽

Adaptive Value ◽

Nicrophorus Vespilloides ◽

Low Levels ◽

Behavioural Trait ◽

Evolutionary Consequences ◽

Benefits And Costs

The parents' phenotype, or the environment they create for their young, can have long-lasting effects on their offspring, with profound evolutionary consequences. Yet, virtually no work has considered how such parental effects might change the adaptive value of behavioural traits expressed by offspring upon reaching adulthood. To address this problem, we combined experiments on burying beetles (Nicrophorus vespilloides) with theoretical modelling and focussed on one adult behavioural trait in particular: the supply of parental care. We manipulated the early-life environment and measured the fitness payoffs associated with the supply of parental care when larvae reached maturity. We found that (1) adults that received low levels of care as larvae were less successful at raising larger broods and suffered greater mortality as a result: they were low-quality parents. Furthermore, (2) high-quality males that raised offspring with low-quality females subsequently suffered greater mortality than brothers of equivalent quality, which reared larvae with higher quality females. Our analyses identify three general ways in which parental effects can change the adaptive value of an adult behavioural trait: by influencing the associated fitness benefits and costs; by consequently changing the evolutionary outcome of social interactions; and by modifying the evolutionarily stable expression of behavioural traits that are themselves parental effects.

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Evolutionary change in the construction of the nursery environment when parents are prevented from caring for their young directly

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.2102450118 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 118 (48) ◽

pp. e2102450118

Author(s):

Ana Duarte ◽

Darren Rebar ◽

Allysa C. Hallett ◽

Benjamin J. M. Jarrett ◽

Rebecca M. Kilner

Keyword(s):

Parental Care ◽

Experimental Evolution ◽

Evolutionary Change ◽

Direct Care ◽

Dead Body ◽

Extended Phenotype ◽

Burying Beetle ◽

Burying Beetles ◽

Nicrophorus Vespilloides ◽

Cross Fostering

Parental care can be partitioned into traits that involve direct engagement with offspring and traits that are expressed as an extended phenotype and influence the developmental environment, such as constructing a nursery. Here, we use experimental evolution to test whether parents can evolve modifications in nursery construction when they are experimentally prevented from supplying care directly to offspring. We exposed replicate experimental populations of burying beetles (Nicrophorus vespilloides) to different regimes of posthatching care by allowing larvae to develop in the presence (Full Care) or absence of parents (No Care). After only 13 generations of experimental evolution, we found an adaptive evolutionary increase in the pace at which parents in the No Care populations converted a dead body into a carrion nest for larvae. Cross-fostering experiments further revealed that No Care larvae performed better on a carrion nest prepared by No Care parents than did Full Care larvae. We conclude that parents construct the nursery environment in relation to their effectiveness at supplying care directly, after offspring are born. When direct care is prevented entirely, they evolve to make compensatory adjustments to the nursery in which their young will develop. The rapid evolutionary change observed in our experiments suggests there is considerable standing genetic variation for parental care traits in natural burying beetle populations—for reasons that remain unclear.

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