TY - JOUR
T1 - Pregnancy reduces concurrent pup care behaviour in meerkats, generating differences between dominant and subordinate females
AU - Rotics, Shay
AU - Groenewoud, Frank
AU - Manser, Marta
AU - Clutton-Brock, Tim
N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2023 The Authors. Journal of Animal Ecology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Ecological Society.
PY - 2023/7
Y1 - 2023/7
N2 - In some mammals, and particularly in cooperative breeding ones, successive bouts of reproduction can overlap so that a female is often pregnant while still nurturing dependent young from her previous litter. Such an overlap requires females to divide their energetic budget between two reproductive activities, and pregnancy costs would consequently be expected to reduce investment in concurrent offspring care. However, explicit evidence for such reductions is scarce, and the potential effects they may have on work division in cooperative breeders have not been explored. Using 25 years of data on reproduction and cooperative behaviour in wild Kalahari meerkats, supplemented with field experiments, we investigated whether pregnancy reduces contributions to cooperative pup care behaviours, including babysitting, provisioning and raised guarding. We also explored whether pregnancy, which is more frequent in dominants than subordinates, could account for the reduced contributions of dominants to the cooperative pup care behaviours. We found that pregnancy, particularly at late stages of gestation, reduces contributions to cooperative pup care; that these reductions are eliminated when the food available to pregnant females is experimentally supplemented; and that pregnancy effects accounted for differences between dominants and subordinates in two of the three cooperative behaviours examined (pup provisioning and raised guarding but not babysitting). By linking pregnancy costs with reductions in concurrent pup care, our findings illuminate a trade-off between investment in successive, overlapping bouts of reproduction. They also suggest that some of the differences in cooperative behaviour between dominant and subordinate females in cooperative breeding mammals can be a direct consequence of differences in their breeding frequency.
AB - In some mammals, and particularly in cooperative breeding ones, successive bouts of reproduction can overlap so that a female is often pregnant while still nurturing dependent young from her previous litter. Such an overlap requires females to divide their energetic budget between two reproductive activities, and pregnancy costs would consequently be expected to reduce investment in concurrent offspring care. However, explicit evidence for such reductions is scarce, and the potential effects they may have on work division in cooperative breeders have not been explored. Using 25 years of data on reproduction and cooperative behaviour in wild Kalahari meerkats, supplemented with field experiments, we investigated whether pregnancy reduces contributions to cooperative pup care behaviours, including babysitting, provisioning and raised guarding. We also explored whether pregnancy, which is more frequent in dominants than subordinates, could account for the reduced contributions of dominants to the cooperative pup care behaviours. We found that pregnancy, particularly at late stages of gestation, reduces contributions to cooperative pup care; that these reductions are eliminated when the food available to pregnant females is experimentally supplemented; and that pregnancy effects accounted for differences between dominants and subordinates in two of the three cooperative behaviours examined (pup provisioning and raised guarding but not babysitting). By linking pregnancy costs with reductions in concurrent pup care, our findings illuminate a trade-off between investment in successive, overlapping bouts of reproduction. They also suggest that some of the differences in cooperative behaviour between dominant and subordinate females in cooperative breeding mammals can be a direct consequence of differences in their breeding frequency.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85161088715&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.13963
DO - https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.13963
M3 - مقالة
C2 - 37277989
SN - 0021-8790
VL - 92
SP - 1431
EP - 1441
JO - Journal of Animal Ecology
JF - Journal of Animal Ecology
IS - 7
ER -