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Behavioral Ecology Vol. 12 No. 1: 16-21
© 2001 International Society for Behavioral Ecology

Male boobies expel eggs when paternity is in doubt

Marcela Osorio-Beristain and Hugh Drummond

Instituto de Ecología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, A.P. 70-275, 04510 D.F., México

Address correspondence to M. Osorio-Beristain. E-mail: mosorio{at}miranda.ecologia.unam.mx .

We analyzed the effect of increased risk of cuckoldry on male parental investment in eggs in the colonial blue-footed booby (Sula nebouxii). Seventeen experimental males were removed from the nesting territory for 10-12 h on a single day, 1-5 days before laying (females' supposed fertile period = SFP), and 17 control males were removed for the same amount of time on a single day, 7-29 days before laying (before the SFP). These removals were intended to simulate extended absence from the nest on a foraging excursion. Female extrapair courtship and copulation rates did not increase during the removal of the social mate, and there was no evidence that experimental and control males differed quantitatively in incubation or defense of the clutch. However, 43% of experimental males expelled the first-laid egg from the nest, whereas no control male did so. Apparently, male boobies drastically reduce parental investment in eggs with a presumed elevated probability of extrapair fertilization by destroying them.

Key words: expelling eggs, infanticide, paternity uncertainty, male parental investment.


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