Conservation biology

Walters, Jeffrey R.; Cooper, Caren B.; Daniels, Stephen; Pasinelli, Gilberto; Schiegg, Karin

doi:10.1017/cbo9780511606816.013

Cited by 19 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 799 publications

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“…Dispersal in sexbiased sibling coalitions may minimize the risk of inbreeding in kin-structured populations while maintaining a high degree of relatedness among members of each sex (Pusey 1987;Lambin et al 2001;Perrin & Goudet 2001). This impact on population kin structure potentially facilitates the evolution and maintenance of social behaviour ( Johnson & Gaines 1990;Ross 2001;Walters et al 2004), and the results from this and other studies together suggest that dispersal patterns in long-tailed tits are indeed reflected by the pattern of helping in this species (Russell 2001;Sharp et al 2008).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 61%

Dispersal of sibling coalitions promotes helping among immigrants in a cooperatively breeding bird

2008

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Kin selection is a major force in social evolution, but dispersal is often assumed to reduce its impact by diluting kinship. In most cooperatively breeding vertebrates, in which more than two individuals care for young, juveniles delay dispersal and become helpers in family groups. In long-tailed tits (Aegithalos caudatus), however, offspring disperse to breed and helpers are failed breeders that preferentially aid kin. Helping also occurs among immigrants, but their origins are unknown and cooperation in these cases is poorly understood. Here, we combine long-term demographic and genetic data from our study population to investigate immigration and helping in this species. We first used a novel application of parentage analysis to discriminate between immigrants and unknown philopatric recruits. We then cross-checked sibship reconstruction with pairwise relatedness estimates to show that immigrants disperse in sibling coalitions and helping among them is kin biased. These results indicate that dispersal need not preclude sociality, and dispersal of kin coalitions may help maintain kin-selected cooperation in the absence of delayed dispersal.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 61%

Dispersal of sibling coalitions promotes helping among immigrants in a cooperatively breeding bird

2008

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“…Previous studies on cooperatively breeding birds have shown that dispersal by either both sexes or, more commonly, by females can be an efficient mechanism to avoid inbreeding (Walters et al . ; Blackmore et al . ; Nelson‐Flower et al .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fine‐scale genetic structure reflects sex‐specific dispersal strategies in a population of sociable weavers (Philetairus socius)

et al. 2015

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Dispersal is a critical driver of gene flow, with important consequences for population genetic structure, social interactions and other biological processes. Limited dispersal may result in kin-structured populations in which kin selection may operate, but it may also increase the risk of kin competition and inbreeding. Here, we use a combination of long-term field data and molecular genetics to examine dispersal patterns and their consequences for the population genetics of a highly social bird, the sociable weaver (Philetairus socius), which exhibits cooperation at various levels of sociality from nuclear family groups to its unique communal nests. Using 20 years of data, involving capture of 6508 birds and 3151 recaptures at 48 colonies, we found that both sexes exhibit philopatry and that any dispersal occurs over relatively short distances. Dispersal is female-biased, with females dispersing earlier, further, and to less closely related destination colonies than males. Genotyping data from 30 colonies showed that this pattern of dispersal is reflected by fine-scale genetic structure for both sexes, revealed by isolation by distance in terms of genetic relatedness and significant genetic variance among colonies. Both relationships were stronger among males than females. Crucially, significant relatedness extended beyond the level of the colony for both sexes. Such fine-scale population genetic structure may have played an important role in the evolution of cooperative behaviour in this species, but it may also result in a significant inbreeding risk, against which female-biased dispersal alone is unlikely to be an effective strategy.

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“…As such, it could represent a strategy to dampen adverse effects of habitat fragmentation by which cooperative species, to some extent, may be more resistant than noncooperative species with similar life history traits (Walters et al . ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…; Riehl ; McDonald ) and on the extent to which it may allow organisms to adaptively respond to large‐scale environmental change (Walters et al . ; Blackmore et al . ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Post‐fragmentation population structure in a cooperative breeding Afrotropical cloud forest bird: emergence of a source‐sink population network

et al. 2015

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The impact of demographic parameters on the genetic population structure and viability of organisms is a long-standing issue in the study of fragmented populations. Demographic and genetic tools are now readily available to estimate census and effective population sizes and migration and gene flow rates with increasing precision. Here we analysed the demography and genetic population structure over a recent 15-year time span in five remnant populations of Cabanis's greenbul (Phyllastrephus cabanisi), a cooperative breeding bird in a severely fragmented cloud forest habitat. Contrary to our expectation, genetic admixture and effective population sizes slightly increased, rather than decreased between our two sampling periods. In spite of small effective population sizes in tiny forest remnants, none of the populations showed evidence of a recent population bottleneck. Approximate Bayesian modelling, however, suggested that differentiation of the populations coincided at least partially with an episode of habitat fragmentation. The ratio of meta-Ne to meta-Nc was relatively low for birds, which is expected for cooperative breeding species, while Ne /Nc ratios strongly varied among local populations. While the overall trend of increasing population sizes and genetic admixture may suggest that Cabanis's greenbuls increasingly cope with fragmentation, the time period over which these trends were documented is rather short relative to the average longevity of tropical species. Furthermore, the critically low Nc in the small forest remnants keep the species prone to demographic and environmental stochasticity, and it remains open if, and to what extent, its cooperative breeding behaviour helps to buffer such effects.

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Conservation biology

Cited by 19 publications

References 799 publications

Dispersal of sibling coalitions promotes helping among immigrants in a cooperatively breeding bird

Dispersal of sibling coalitions promotes helping among immigrants in a cooperatively breeding bird

Fine‐scale genetic structure reflects sex‐specific dispersal strategies in a population of sociable weavers (Philetairus socius)

Post‐fragmentation population structure in a cooperative breeding Afrotropical cloud forest bird: emergence of a source‐sink population network

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