Maternal care affects chicks’ development differently according to sex in quail

Abstract

Maternal behavior is known to influence the behavioral development of young. Recently, it was demonstrated that maternal behavior also differed according to sex chicks and brood sex composition. So, here, we explored if these factors influenced behavioral development of chicks quail when they were brooded, and what characteristics of chicks and foster females could best explain this development. We studied three sets of chick pairs brooded by foster females: unisex male, unisex female, and mixed broods. We found that both emotivity profile and sociality depended on the sex: females were more reactive and less social than males. Females' emotivity profile was correlated with brood composition and foster female activity during maternal care. In males, only sociality was correlated with foster females' scores of aggressive rejection. Our results evidence that male and female chicks respond differentially to maternal behavior. This is discussed in terms of ecological and physiological constraints on development according to sex.

Chicks from stressed females elicit overprotective behaviour in adoptive mother quail

“…Parents can adjust their behaviour to the specific needs of their young according to their sex or their condition for instance (Aigueperse et al, 2019(Aigueperse et al, , 2018Stěhulová et al, 2013;White et al, 2007). Parents can respond by providing more efficient developmental conditions, thereby optimising their parental investment (Kölliker and Richner, 2001).…”

Mothers provide similar care to related and unrelated chicks in quail

“…However, the influence of the adopted chicks on parental behaviour and on chicks' behaviour has been very few studied, even if it is known that some features of the chick (such as sex) or of the brood (e.g. size) can affect parental cares (Aigueperse et al, 2019(Aigueperse et al, , 2018(Aigueperse et al, , 2017. In mammals, mothers usually recognize first the nest before the pup themselves (Gubernick, 1981).…”

Rôle de l'environnement précoce dans la variabilité des phénotypes et l’adaptation des animaux d’élevage à leur milieu

“…Ceci met en évidence une influence postnatale directe de la mère sur le développement phénotypique des jeunes, via deux mécanismes parallèles : i) le soin qu'elle leur donne, en apportant une base de sécurité (« maternal care », exemple du léchage/toilettage des jeunes chez la souris, Francis et al, 1999), et ii) le modèle qu'elle représente avec une transmission non génétique de certains comportements par observation ou imitation (cf. encadré 3 et Formanek et al, 2008 ;Aigueperse et al, 2018).…”