Wherever I may roam: social viscosity and kin affiliation in a wild population despite natal dispersal.

ABSTRACT: Dispersal affects the social contexts individuals experience by redistributing individuals in space, and the nature of social interactions can have important fitness consequences. During the vagrancy stage of natal dispersal, after an individual has left its natal site and before it has settled to breed, social affiliations might be predicted by opportunities to associate (e.g., distance in space and time between natal points of origin) or kin preferences. We investigated the social structure of a population of juvenile great tits (Parus major) and asked whether social affiliations during vagrancy were predicted by 1) the distance between natal nest-boxes, 2) synchrony in fledge dates, and 3) accounting for spatial and temporal predictors, whether siblings tended to stay together. W

SUBMITTER: Grabowska-Zhang AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4943112 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Jul-Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature