Abstract
Evolutionary ecologists are attempting to explain how parents make behavioural decisions about how much care to provide to their young1,2,3,4. Theory predicts that when genetic relatedness to young is decreased by cuckoldry, for example, parents should reduce their care in favour of alternative broods that provide greater reproductive success5,6,7. Experimental manipulation of perceived paternity has been used to test the theory8,9, but such studies have generated mixed results10,11,12,13. Some manipulations can fail to alter a parent's perceived paternity14, whereas others may directly affect parental behaviour when, for instance, the manipulation involves capturing the parent15,16,17,18. No study has demonstrated parental care adjustment in a manner uncomplicated by experimental design or life history correlates. Here I test the theory using the fact that nest-tending parental male bluegill sunfish (Lepomis macrochirus) can assess their paternity using both the visual presence of parasitic cuckolder males during spawning19, and olfactory cues released by newly hatched eggs20,21. By manipulating both types of cues I show that parental males dynamically adjust their parental care, favouring broods that are apparently most closely related. These results confirm the importance of genetic relatedness in parental care decision-making.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 51 print issues and online access
$199.00 per year
only $3.90 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Westneat, D. F. & Sargent, R. C. Sex and parenting: the effects of sexual conflict and parentage on parental strategies. Trends Ecol. Evol. 11, 87–91 (1996)
Sargent, R. C. & Gross, M. R. in The Behaviour of Teleost Fishes (ed. Pitcher, T. J.) 275–293 (Chapman & Hall, New York, 1993)
Burke, T., Davies, N. B., Bruford, M. W. & Hatchwell, B. J. Parental care and mating behaviour of polyandrous dunnocks Prunella modularis related to paternity by DNA fingerprinting. Nature 338, 249–251 (1989)
Dixon, A., Ross, D., Omalley, S. L. C. & Burke, T. Paternal investment inversely related to degree of extra-pair paternity in the reed bunting. Nature 371, 698–700 (1994)
Trivers, R. L. in Sexual Selection and the Descent of Man (ed. Campbell, B.) 136–179 (Aldine, Chicago, 1972)
Westneat, D. F. & Sherman, P. W. Parentage and the evolution of parental behavior. Behav. Ecol. 4, 66–77 (1993)
Kokko, H. Cuckoldry and the stability of biparental care. Ecol. Lett. 2, 247–255 (1999)
Lessells, C. M. in Behavioural Ecology: an Evolutionary Approach (eds Krebs, J. R. & Davies, N. B.) 32–68 (Blackwell, Oxford, 1991)
Kempenaers, B. & Sheldon, B. C. Studying paternity and parental care: pitfalls and problems. Anim. Behav. 53, 423–427 (1997)
Kempenaers, B., Lanctot, R. B. & Robertson, R. J. Certainty of paternity and paternal investment in eastern bluebirds and tree swallows. Anim. Behav. 55, 845–860 (1998)
MacDougall-Shackleton, E. A. & Robertson, R. J. Confidence of paternity and paternal care by eastern bluebirds. Behav. Ecol. 9, 201–205 (1998)
Sheldon, B. C. & Ellegren, H. Paternal effort related to experimentally manipulated paternity of male collared flycatchers. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B 265, 1737–1742 (1998)
Hunt, J. & Simmons, L. W. Confidence of paternity and paternal care: covariation revealed through the experimental manipulation of the mating system in the beetle Onthophagus taurus. J. Evol. Biol. 15, 784–795 (2002)
Neff, B. D. & Sherman, P. W. Decision making and recognition mechanisms. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B. 269, 1435–1441 (2002)
Jamieson, I. G. & Quinn, J. S. Problems with removal experiments designed to test the relationship between paternity and parental effort in a socially polyandrous bird. Auk 114, 291–295 (1997)
Wright, J. in Sperm Competition and Sexual Selection (eds Birkhead, T. R. & Møller, A. P.) 117–145 (Academic, London, 1998)
Kokko, H. & McRae, S. B. Take care when studying parenting behaviour. Trends Ecol. Evol. 15, 440–441 (2000)
Sheldon, B. C. Relating paternity to paternal care. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B 357, 341–350 (2002)
Neff, B. D. & Gross, M. R. Dynamic adjustment of parental care in response to perceived paternity. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B 268, 1559–1565 (2001)
Neff, B. D. & Sherman, P. W. Nestling recognition via direct cues by parental male bluegill sunfish (Lepomis macrochirus). Anim. Cogn. (in the press)
Neff, B. D. & Sherman, P. W. Kin recognition via self-referencing by a fish with paternal care and cuckoldry. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B (submitted)
Dominey, W. J. Female mimicry in male bluegill sunfish—a genetic polymorphism? Nature 284, 546–548 (1980)
Gross, M. R. Sneakers, satellites and parental males: polymorphic mating strategies in North American sunfishes. Z. Tierpsychol. 60, 1–26 (1982)
Coleman, R. M. & Fischer, R. U. Brood size, male fanning effort and the energetics of a non-shareable parental investment in bluegill sunfish, Lepomis macrochirus (Teleostei: Centrarchidae). Ethology 87, 177–188 (1991)
Cargnelli, L. M. & Gross, M. R. The temporal dimension in fish recruitment: birth date, body size, and size-dependent survival in a sunfish (bluegill: Lepomis macrochirus). Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci. 53, 360–367 (1996)
Fu, P., Neff, B. D. & Gross, M. R. Tactic-specific success in sperm competition. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B 268, 1105–1112 (2001)
Brown, G. E. & Brown, J. A. Kin discrimination in salmonids. Rev. Fish Biol. Fish. 6, 201–219 (1996)
Neff, B. D. Genetic paternity analysis and breeding success in bluegill sunfish (Lepomis macrochirus). J. Hered. 92, 111–119 (2001)
Acknowledgements
I thank L. M. Cargnelli, M. R. Gross, E. A. MacDougall-Shackleton, J. D. Olden, T. E. Pitcher and P. W. Sherman, and H. Kokko, J. D. Reynolds and B. C. Sheldon for comments on this work. I am indebted to P. Fu for providing field assistance. This work was conducted at the Queen's University Biological Station and conformed to protocols outlined by the Canadian Council on Animal Care. The research was supported by the Sigma Xi and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The author declares that he has no competing financial interests.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Neff, B. Decisions about parental care in response to perceived paternity. Nature 422, 716–719 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01528
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01528
This article is cited by
-
Post-spawning defence by male brook charr is linked to perceived paternity
Environmental Biology of Fishes (2023)
-
Neural pathways of olfactory kin imprinting and kin recognition in zebrafish
Cell and Tissue Research (2021)
-
Factors Influencing Sexual Vocalization in Human Females
Archives of Sexual Behavior (2021)
-
Oviposition and father presence reduce clutch cannibalism by female poison frogs
Frontiers in Zoology (2019)
-
Nest defense in the face of cuckoldry: evolutionary rather than facultative adaptation to chronic paternity loss
BMC Evolutionary Biology (2019)
Comments
By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.