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Duncan C, Thorley J, Manser MB, Clutton-Brock T. Dominance loss and tenure maintenance in Kalahari meerkats. Behav Ecol 2023; 34:979-991. [PMID: 37969548 PMCID: PMC10636735 DOI: 10.1093/beheco/arad066] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/17/2023] [Revised: 07/10/2023] [Accepted: 07/31/2023] [Indexed: 11/17/2023] Open
Abstract
In many social species, both the acquisition of dominance and the duration that individuals maintain their status are important determinants of breeding tenure and lifetime reproductive success. However, few studies have yet examined the extent and causes of variation in dominance tenure and the duration of breeding lifespans. Here, we investigate the processes that terminate dominance tenures and examine how they differ between the sexes in wild Kalahari meerkats (Suricata suricatta), a cooperative breeder where a dominant breeding pair produces most of the young recruited into each group. Mortality and displacement by resident subordinate competitors were important forms of dominance loss for both sexes. However, dominant males (but rarely females) were also at risk of takeovers by extra-group invading males. Dominant males also differed from dominant females in that they abandoned their group after the death of their breeding partner, when no other breeding opportunities were present, whereas dominant females that lost their partner remained and continued to breed in the same group. We show that a larger number of processes can terminate dominance tenure in males with the result that the average male tenure of breeding positions was shorter than that of females, which contributes to the reduced variance in the lifetime reproductive success in males compared to females. Our analysis suggests that sex differences in emigration and immigration may often have downstream consequences for sex differences in reproductive variance and for the selection pressures operating on females and males.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chris Duncan
- Large Animal Research Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
- Kalahari Research Centre, Kuruman River Reserve, Northern Cape 8467, South Africa
| | - Jack Thorley
- Large Animal Research Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
- Kalahari Research Centre, Kuruman River Reserve, Northern Cape 8467, South Africa
| | - Marta B Manser
- Kalahari Research Centre, Kuruman River Reserve, Northern Cape 8467, South Africa
- Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, 8057 Zurich, Switzerland
- Mammal Research Institute, University of Pretoria, 0028 Pretoria, South Africa
| | - Tim Clutton-Brock
- Large Animal Research Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK
- Kalahari Research Centre, Kuruman River Reserve, Northern Cape 8467, South Africa
- Mammal Research Institute, University of Pretoria, 0028 Pretoria, South Africa
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Berger V, Lemaître JF, Allainé D, Gaillard JM, Cohas A. Early and Adult Social Environments Shape Sex-Specific Actuarial Senescence Patterns in a Cooperative Breeder. Am Nat 2018; 192:525-536. [PMID: 30205028 DOI: 10.1086/699513] [Citation(s) in RCA: 26] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/03/2022]
Abstract
Sociality modulates life-history traits through changes in resource allocation to fitness-related traits. However, how social factors at different stages of the life cycle modulate senescence remains poorly understood. To address this question, we assessed the influence of social environment in both early life and adulthood on actuarial senescence in the Alpine marmot, a cooperative breeder. The influence of helpers on actuarial senescence strongly differed depending on when help was provided and on the sex of the dominant. Being helped when adult slowed down senescence in both sexes. However, the effect of the presence of helpers during the year of birth of a dominant was sex specific. Among dominants helped during adulthood, females born in the presence of helpers senesced slower, whereas males senesced faster. Among dominants without helpers during adulthood, females with helpers at birth senesced faster. Social environment modulates senescence but acts differently between sexes and life stages.
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Stress levels of dominants reflect underlying conflicts with subordinates in a cooperatively breeding species. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 2018. [DOI: 10.1007/s00265-018-2484-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/17/2022]
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Zhang XY, Lou MF, Shen W, Fu RS, Wang DH. A Maternal Low-Fiber Diet Predisposes Offspring to Improved Metabolic Phenotypes in Adulthood in an Herbivorous Rodent. Physiol Biochem Zool 2017; 90:75-84. [DOI: 10.1086/688978] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/03/2022]
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Beneficial effects of group size on oxidative balance in a wild cooperative breeder. Behav Ecol 2016. [DOI: 10.1093/beheco/arw114] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
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Lardy S, Allainé D, Bonenfant C, Cohas A. Sex-specific determinants of fitness in a social mammal. Ecology 2015; 96:2947-59. [DOI: 10.1890/15-0425.1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/18/2022]
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Hiadlovská Z, Mikula O, Macholán M, Hamplová P, Vošlajerová Bímová B, Daniszová K. Shaking the myth: Body mass, aggression, steroid hormones, and social dominance in wild house mouse. Gen Comp Endocrinol 2015; 223:16-26. [PMID: 26433061 DOI: 10.1016/j.ygcen.2015.09.033] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/11/2015] [Revised: 09/19/2015] [Accepted: 09/29/2015] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
Abstract
In social mammals, the position of a male in the group's hierarchy strongly affects his reproductive success. Since a high social rank is often gained through competition with other males, selection should favour bigger males over smaller ones. We may therefore predict faster growth and/or delayed sexual maturity in dominant males. Likewise, dominants should have higher levels of testosterone, hormone important in many aspects of male dominance. Less obvious is the relationship between dominance and levels of corticosterone but generally higher concentrations are expected in subordinate individuals. We studied body growth, sexual maturation and endocrinal changes in males of two house mouse subspecies, raised in fraternal pairs. Since Mus musculus domesticus is the subspecies which dominates mutual encounters with Mus musculus musculus we predicted higher growth rate, delayed puberty and aggression, and higher testosterone and corticosterone levels in domesticus males compared to musculus. In all comparisons, no differences were found between dominant and subordinate musculus brothers. On the other hand, in M. m. domesticus, dominant males revealed a different growth trajectory and lower corticosterone levels than subordinate males but not delayed puberty and higher testosterone concentrations, thus contradicting our predictions. In inter-subspecific comparisons, musculus males matured earlier but became aggressive at the same time as domesticus males. The musculus testosterone ontogeny suggests that social positions in this subspecies remain unfixed for an extended period and that the increasing levels probably reflect prolonged hierarchy contests. It appears that the ontogeny of behaviour and physiological traits diverge cryptically between the two subspecies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Z Hiadlovská
- Institute of Animal Physiology and Genetics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Veveří 97, CZ-602 00 Brno, Czech Republic.
| | - O Mikula
- Institute of Animal Physiology and Genetics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Veveří 97, CZ-602 00 Brno, Czech Republic
| | - M Macholán
- Institute of Animal Physiology and Genetics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Veveří 97, CZ-602 00 Brno, Czech Republic; Institute of Botany and Zoology, Faculty of Science, Masaryk University, Kotlářská 2, CZ-61137 Brno, Czech Republic
| | - P Hamplová
- Institute of Botany and Zoology, Faculty of Science, Masaryk University, Kotlářská 2, CZ-61137 Brno, Czech Republic
| | - B Vošlajerová Bímová
- Institute of Animal Physiology and Genetics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Veveří 97, CZ-602 00 Brno, Czech Republic; Institute of Vertebrate Biology, ASCR, Květná 8, CZ-603 65 Brno, Czech Republic
| | - K Daniszová
- Institute of Vertebrate Biology, ASCR, Květná 8, CZ-603 65 Brno, Czech Republic; Biodiversity Research Group, Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Charles University, 13 Viničná 7, CZ-128 44 Prague, Czech Republic
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