Aggression towards shared enemies by heterospecific and conspecific cichlid fish neighbours.

ABSTRACT: Successful territory defence is a prerequisite for reproduction across many taxa, and often highly sensitive to the actions of territorial neighbours. Nevertheless, to date, assessments of the significance of the behaviour of heterospecific neighbours have been infrequent and taxonomically restricted. In this field study, I examined the importance of both heterospecific and conspecific neighbours in a biparental fish, the convict cichlid, Amatitlania siquia. This was done by assessing the colonisation rates of vacant territories, the rates of aggression by the territory holders, and the overall rates of aggression towards intruders, in treatments that controlled the proximity of both neighbour types. Convict cichlid pairs colonised vacant nesting resources (territory locations) at similar

SUBMITTER: Lehtonen TK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6763407 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature