Der Einfluss vonindividuellen Verhaltensunterschieden auf die Qualität der Brutpflege am Beispiel mariner Grundeln.
Zusammenfassung der Projektergebnisse
Many animal parents invest heavily to ensure offspring survival, yet some eventually consume some or all of their very own young. This so-called filial cannibalism is known from a wide range of taxa, but its adaptive benefit remains largely unclear. The extent to which parents cannibalize their broods varies substantially not only between species, but also between individuals, indicating that intrinsic behavioural differences, or animal personalities, might constitute a relevant proximate trigger for filial cannibalism. Using a marine fish with extensive paternal care, the common goby Pomatoschistus microps, we investigated the influence of animal personality on filial cannibalism by assessing (1) behavioural consistency across a breeding and a non-breeding context, (2) correlations between different breeding (egg fanning; filial cannibalism) and non-breeding (activity, boldness, exploration, and feeding) behaviours, and, in separate experiments, (3) whether previously established personality scores affect filial cannibalism levels, nest competition success, and mating success. Furthermore, we hypothesized one behavioural type to be more successful in occupying nests and recruiting females for spawning than other types. Therefore, we finally (4) tested female repeatability and consistency of nest and mate preferences and studied the conflict of male and female variation in preferences for different nest attributes. We found consistent individual differences in activity across contexts. Filial cannibalism correlated strongly with activity. High activity males cannibalised more eggs than low activity males. This constitutes the first evidence to date that male personality affects paternal care, and thus reproductive success, in a uniparental species. We showed that animal personality in common gobies can affect fitness: More active males, perhaps as a negative spill-over effect, were more likely to cannibalize part of their eggs, at least early in the season, and independent of other paternal care traits. Our findings indicate that filial cannibalism cannot be adjusted independently of male personality and is thus phenotypically less plastic than typically assumed. We also found surprisingly high inter-individual female consistency of mating preferences and apparent importance of nest properties. Our findings indicate that fitness benefits of the male personality type only materialize in environments where nesting sites are a limiting resource. We found that slow-feeding individuals occupied nests more frequently when nesting sites were scarce, but spawning success was independent of male personality when both males were provided with a nesting site. Instead, females showed a remarkably consistent between-female spawning preference for slightly heavier males and males with more elaborate nests. Our study on male and female preferences for different nest models suggest that there is possibly an underlying conflict of interests between male and female gobies regarding nest characteristics. Males showed tendency to prefer wide-entrance and high-covered nests. Opposite to this, female gobies in this study showed a preference for nests that had narrow, unadjustable openings. This might force the males to trade-off between ease of paternal care and female attraction. On the whole, the present work stresses the multidimensional interaction between animal personality, individual plasticity and the environment in shaping filial cannibalism.
Projektbezogene Publikationen (Auswahl)
- Male personality and female spawning consistency in a goby with exclusive male care. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, May 2016, Volume 70, Issue 5, pp 683–693
Kalb N, Lindström K, Sprenger D, Anthes N, Heubel KU
(Siehe online unter https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-016-2089-z) - You eat what you are: Personality-dependent filial cannibalism in a fish with paternal care. Ecology & Evolution, 6,5, March 2016
Pages 1340-1352
Vallon MA, Grom C, Kalb N, Sprenger N, Anthes N, Lindström K, and Heubel KU
(Siehe online unter https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.1966)
