How cooperatively breeding birds identify relatives and avoid incest: New insights into dispersal and kin recognition

@article{Riehl2015HowCB,
  title={How cooperatively breeding birds identify relatives and avoid incest: New insights into dispersal and kin recognition},
  author={Christina Riehl and Caitlin A. Stern},
  journal={BioEssays},
  year={2015},
  volume={37}
}
Cooperative breeding in birds typically occurs when offspring – usually males – delay dispersal from their natal group, remaining with the family to help rear younger kin. Sex‐biased dispersal is thought to have evolved in order to reduce the risk of inbreeding, resulting in low relatedness between mates and the loss of indirect fitness benefits for the dispersing sex. In this review, we discuss several recent studies showing that dispersal patterns are more variable than previously thought… 
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24 Citations

A hierarchical analysis of incest avoidance in a cooperative breeder

TLDR
Although recognition is required to avoid incest when pairing in winter groups or settling near home, female-biased dispersal reduces likelihood of incest to near zero, even when males disperse relatively short distances (e.g., 2 km) from where they were born.

Cost, risk, and avoidance of inbreeding in a cooperatively breeding bird

TLDR
In long-tailed tits (Aegithalos caudatus), a cooperative breeder that risks inbreeding by living alongside opposite-sex relatives, inbreeding carries fitness costs and is avoided by active kin discrimination during mate choice, indicating that inbreeding is costly.

Investment patterns and kinship cues in a cooperatively breeding bird

TLDR
It is found that sealed-bid and conditional cooperation models are inappropriate to describe investment in riflemen, and possible reasons for this are discussed, and the validity of provisioning rate as a measure of food delivery in Riflemen is demonstrated.

Kinship and Incest Avoidance Drive Patterns of Reproductive Skew in Cooperatively Breeding Birds

  • C. Riehl
  • Biology
    The American Naturalist
  • 2017
TLDR
Analysis of data from 83 species of cooperatively breeding birds finds that kinship within the breeding group is a powerful predictor of reproductive sharing across species, and suggests that incest avoidance, rather than suppression by dominant breeders, may be an important proximate mechanism limiting reproduction by subordinates.

BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES 1 Cost, risk and avoidance of inbreeding in a cooperatively breeding bird 2

TLDR
Long-tailed tits use the same kin discrimination rule to avoid inbreeding as they do to direct help towards kin, as well as show that the vocal relatives offers a probable recognition mechanism for this observed level of kin discrimination during mate choice.

Helping decisions and kin recognition in long-tailed tits: is call similarity used to direct help towards kin?

TLDR
It is concluded that although vocalizations are an important part of the recognition system of long-tailed tits, discrimination is likely to be based on prior association and may involve a combination of vocal and non-vocal cues.

Social dynamics in nonbreeding flocks of a cooperatively breeding bird: causes and consequences of kin associations

Kin do not always help: testing multiple hypotheses on nest feeding in a cooperatively breeding bird

In cooperatively breeding species, group members may derive multiple benefits from helping to raise other individuals’ offspring, yet not all individuals do so. In this study, we tested predictions…

Individuality, kin similarity and experimental playback of contact calls in cooperatively breeding riflemen

TLDR
It is concluded that zip calls are suitable kin recognition cues, but whether they are used as such remains unknown.

Mixed Mating in a Multi-Origin Population Suggests High Potential for Genetic Rescue in North Island Brown Kiwi, Apteryx mantelli

TLDR
Analysis of mating and its consequences for genomic admixture in the North Island brown kiwi Apteryx mantelli population on Ponui Island suggests potential for successful genetic rescue in future ApteryX reinforcement translocations, a potential that is currently under utilised due to restrictive translocation policies.

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