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      Should I stay or should I go? Fitness costs and benefits of prolonged parent–offspring and sibling–sibling associations in an Arctic-nesting goose population

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          Abstract

          Theory predicts persistence of long-term family relationships in vertebrates will occur until perceived fitness costs exceed benefits to either parents or offspring. We examined whether increased breeding probability and survival were associated with prolonged parent–offspring and sibling–sibling relationships in a long-lived Arctic migrant herbivore, the Greenland white-fronted goose ( Anser albifrons flavirostris). Although offspring associated with parents for 1–13 years, 79 % of these associations lasted two or less years. Only 65 (9.9 %) of the 656 marked offspring bred once in their lifetime, and just 16 (2.4 %) bred twice or more. The probability of birds with siblings breeding successfully in a subsequent year was credibly greater than that of independent birds at ages 5, 6, and 7. Survival of offspring with parents was credibly greater than that of independent/nonbreeder birds at all possible ages (i.e., ages 2–7+). A cost–benefit matrix model utilizing breeding and survival probabilities showed that staying with family groups was favored over leaving until age 3, after which there were no credible differences between staying and leaving strategies until the oldest ages, when leaving family groups was favored. Thus, most birds in this study either departed family groups early (e.g., at age 2, when the “stay” strategy was favored) or as predicted by our cost–benefit model (i.e., at age 3). Although extended family associations are a feature of this population, we contend that the survival benefits are not sufficient enough to yield clear fitness benefits, and associations only persist because parents and offspring mutually benefit from their persistence.

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          The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00442-016-3595-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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          Parental investment and sexual selection

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            Helpers among Birds

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              Social learning in birds and its role in shaping a foraging niche.

              We briefly review the literature on social learning in birds, concluding that strong evidence exists mainly for predator recognition, song, mate choice and foraging. The mechanism of local enhancement may be more important than imitation for birds learning to forage, but the former mechanism may be sufficient for faithful transmission depending on the ecological circumstances. To date, most insights have been gained from birds in captivity. We present a study of social learning of foraging in two passerine birds in the wild, where we cross-fostered eggs between nests of blue tits, Cyanistes caeruleus and great tits, Parus major. Early learning causes a shift in the foraging sites used by the tits in the direction of the foster species. The shift in foraging niches was consistent across seasons, as showed by an analysis of prey items, and the effect lasted for life. The fact that young birds learn from their foster parents, and use this experience later when subsequently feeding their own offspring, suggests that foraging behaviour can be culturally transmitted over generations in the wild. It may therefore have both ecological and evolutionary consequences, some of which are discussed.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                weegm009@umn.edu
                Journal
                Oecologia
                Oecologia
                Oecologia
                Springer Berlin Heidelberg (Berlin/Heidelberg )
                0029-8549
                1432-1939
                19 March 2016
                19 March 2016
                2016
                : 181
                : 809-817
                Affiliations
                [ ]Centre for Ecology and Conservation, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Cornwall Campus, Penryn, TR10 9EZ UK
                [ ]Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust, Slimbridge, Gloucester, GL2 7BT UK
                [ ]National Parks and Wildlife Service, Wexford Wildfowl Reserve, North Slob, Wexford, Ireland
                [ ]Department of Biosciences, University of Exeter, Streatham Campus, Exeter, EX4 4QD UK
                [ ]Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Kalø, Grenåvej 14, 8410 Rønde, Denmark
                Author notes

                Communicated by Hannu Pöysä.

                Article
                3595
                10.1007/s00442-016-3595-4
                4912589
                26995680
                39923232-08ff-4d94-a7c1-617349670b76
                © The Author(s) 2016

                Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

                History
                : 13 October 2014
                : 24 February 2016
                Funding
                Funded by: Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust
                Categories
                Population Ecology–Original Research
                Custom metadata
                © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2016

                Ecology
                bayesian multistate model,cost–benefit model,fitness,greenland white-fronted goose,breeding probability,long-term family relationship

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