Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales
This is the final version. Available on open access from Cell Press via the DOI in this record Data and code availability All data and code necessary to replicate analyses in this study have been deposited on Zenodo (DOI:10.5281/zenodo.7457806). Parents often sacrifice their own future reproductive...
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ftunivexeter:oai:ore.exeter.ac.uk:10871/132109 2023-05-15T17:53:55+02:00 Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales Weiss, MN Ellis, S Franks, DW Nielsen, MLK Cant, MA Johnstone, RA Ellifrit, DK Balcomb, KC Croft, DP 2022 http://hdl.handle.net/10871/132109 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2022.12.057 en eng Cell Press https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7457806 Current Biology orcid:0000-0001-6869-5097 (Croft, Darren) Published online 8 February 2023 doi:10.1016/j.cub.2022.12.057 NE/S010327/1 NE/L002434/1 http://hdl.handle.net/10871/132109 1879-0445 © 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC-BY life history strategies Orcinus orca parental care Article 2022 ftunivexeter https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2022.12.057 https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7457806 2023-02-17T00:03:58Z This is the final version. Available on open access from Cell Press via the DOI in this record Data and code availability All data and code necessary to replicate analyses in this study have been deposited on Zenodo (DOI:10.5281/zenodo.7457806). Parents often sacrifice their own future reproductive success to boost the survival of their offspring, a phenomenon referred to as parental investment. In several social mammals, mothers continue to improve the survival of their offspring well into adulthood, however whether this extended care comes at a reproductive costs to mothers, and therefore represents maternal investment, is not well understood. We tested whether lifetime maternal care is a form of parental investment in fish-eating “resident” killer whales. Adult killer whales, particularly males, are known to receive survival benefits from their mothers, however whether this comes at a cost to mothers’ reproductive success is not known. Using multiple decades of complete census data from the “southern resident” population, we found a strong negative correlation between females’ number of surviving weaned sons and their annual probability of producing a viable calf. This negative effect did not attenuate as sons grew older, and the cost of sons could not be explained by long-term costs of lactation or group composition effects, supporting the hypothesis that caring for adult sons is reproductively costly. This is the first direct evidence of lifetime maternal investment in an iteroparous animal, revealing a previously unknown life history strategy. Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) Leverhulme Trust Article in Journal/Newspaper Orca Orcinus orca University of Exeter: Open Research Exeter (ORE) Current Biology 33 4 744 748.e3 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
University of Exeter: Open Research Exeter (ORE) |
op_collection_id |
ftunivexeter |
language |
English |
topic |
life history strategies Orcinus orca parental care |
spellingShingle |
life history strategies Orcinus orca parental care Weiss, MN Ellis, S Franks, DW Nielsen, MLK Cant, MA Johnstone, RA Ellifrit, DK Balcomb, KC Croft, DP Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales |
topic_facet |
life history strategies Orcinus orca parental care |
description |
This is the final version. Available on open access from Cell Press via the DOI in this record Data and code availability All data and code necessary to replicate analyses in this study have been deposited on Zenodo (DOI:10.5281/zenodo.7457806). Parents often sacrifice their own future reproductive success to boost the survival of their offspring, a phenomenon referred to as parental investment. In several social mammals, mothers continue to improve the survival of their offspring well into adulthood, however whether this extended care comes at a reproductive costs to mothers, and therefore represents maternal investment, is not well understood. We tested whether lifetime maternal care is a form of parental investment in fish-eating “resident” killer whales. Adult killer whales, particularly males, are known to receive survival benefits from their mothers, however whether this comes at a cost to mothers’ reproductive success is not known. Using multiple decades of complete census data from the “southern resident” population, we found a strong negative correlation between females’ number of surviving weaned sons and their annual probability of producing a viable calf. This negative effect did not attenuate as sons grew older, and the cost of sons could not be explained by long-term costs of lactation or group composition effects, supporting the hypothesis that caring for adult sons is reproductively costly. This is the first direct evidence of lifetime maternal investment in an iteroparous animal, revealing a previously unknown life history strategy. Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) Leverhulme Trust |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Weiss, MN Ellis, S Franks, DW Nielsen, MLK Cant, MA Johnstone, RA Ellifrit, DK Balcomb, KC Croft, DP |
author_facet |
Weiss, MN Ellis, S Franks, DW Nielsen, MLK Cant, MA Johnstone, RA Ellifrit, DK Balcomb, KC Croft, DP |
author_sort |
Weiss, MN |
title |
Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales |
title_short |
Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales |
title_full |
Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales |
title_fullStr |
Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales |
title_full_unstemmed |
Costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales |
title_sort |
costly lifetime maternal investment in killer whales |
publisher |
Cell Press |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/10871/132109 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2022.12.057 |
genre |
Orca Orcinus orca |
genre_facet |
Orca Orcinus orca |
op_relation |
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7457806 Current Biology orcid:0000-0001-6869-5097 (Croft, Darren) Published online 8 February 2023 doi:10.1016/j.cub.2022.12.057 NE/S010327/1 NE/L002434/1 http://hdl.handle.net/10871/132109 1879-0445 |
op_rights |
© 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2022.12.057 https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7457806 |
container_title |
Current Biology |
container_volume |
33 |
container_issue |
4 |
container_start_page |
744 |
op_container_end_page |
748.e3 |
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1766161621853405184 |