Investigating inbreeding avoidance and dispersal in a contained population of the Seychelles warbler

C. Eikenaar, J. Komdeur, D. S. Richardson

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26 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In this study, we test whether patterns of territory inheritance, social mate choice and female-biased natal dispersal act as inbreeding avoidance mechanisms in the cooperatively breeding Seychelles warbler. Our results show that Seychelles warblers do not reduce the likelihood of inbreeding by avoiding related individuals as mates. The occurrence of natural and experimentally induced territory inheritance did not depend on whether the remaining breeder was a parent of the potential inheritor or an unrelated breeder. Furthermore, dispersing individuals were no less related to their eventual mates than expected given the pool of candidates they could mate with. The female bias in natal dispersal distance observed in the Seychelles warbler does not facilitate inbreeding avoidance because, contrary to our prediction, there was no sex difference in the clustering of related opposite sex breeders around the natal territories of dispersers. As a result, the chance of females mating with relatives was not reduced by their greater dispersal distance compared with that of males.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1106-1116
Number of pages11
JournalJournal of Evolutionary Biology
Volume21
Issue number4
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jul 2008

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