Breeding system evolution in light of demographic sex-bias

Talk Luke Eberhart-Phillips, Seewiesen

  • Datum: 09.03.2017
  • Uhrzeit: 13:00 - 14:00
  • Vortragende(r): Luke Eberhart-Phillips
  • Bielefeld University, Dept. of Animal Behaviour
  • Ort: Seewiesen
  • Raum: Seminar Room House 4, Tea & Coffee 12:30h
  • Gastgeber: Dr. Clemens Küpper
  • Kontakt: ckuepper@orn.mpg.de
Sex ratio variation is a fundamental component of life history evolution. At conception, birth, and adulthood, the ratios of males to females have long been recognized by evolutionary biologists and human demographers as catalysts for social behaviour and population dynamics. Throughout human and wild animal populations, variation in the adult sex ratio is remarkable and has been shown to predict divorce, sexual aggression, and parental cooperation. Causality is unclear, but clues may become apparent through understanding the life history origins of the adult sex ratio. Join me as I attempt to unravel the demographic pathways that shape sex biases and assess their evolutionary consequences on parental and mating strategies. I will present recent results from a detailed demographic analysis across several species of Charadrius plover – a small ground-nesting shorebird found in a variety of ecosystems worldwide. Plovers exhibit a remarkable diversity in breeding behaviour: sex roles during courtship, mating, and parental care vary considerably among populations both between and within species. This behavioural variation, coupled with their extreme tractability in the field, allow the opportunity to confidently explore the sources and significance of demographic sex-biases among wild populations in light of breeding system evolution.
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