Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY B-BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
Volume 277, Issue 1698, Pages 3299-3306Publisher
ROYAL SOC
DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2010.0737
Keywords
kinship; kin selection; indirect fitness; helper; provisioning effort; long-tailed tits
Categories
Funding
- University of Sheffield
- Natural Environment Research Council
- Leverhulme Research Fellowship
- NERC [NE/E006655/1, NBAF010001] Funding Source: UKRI
- Natural Environment Research Council [NBAF010001, NE/E006655/1] Funding Source: researchfish
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Helping behaviour in cooperative breeding systems has been attributed to kin selection, but the relative roles of direct and indirect fitness benefits in the evolution of such systems remain a matter of debate. In theory, helpers could maximize the indirect fitness benefits of cooperation by investing more in broods with whom they are more closely related, but there is little evidence for such fine-scale adjustment in helper effort among cooperative vertebrates. In this study, we used the unusual cooperative breeding system of the long-tailed tit Aegithalos caudatus to test the hypothesis that the provisioning effort of helpers was positively correlated with their kinship to broods. We first use pedigrees and microsatellite genotypes to characterize the relatedness between helpers and breeders from a 14 year field study. We used both pedigree and genetic approaches because long-tailed tits have access to pedigree information acquired through social relationships, but any fitness consequences will be determined by genetic relatedness. We then show using both pedigrees and genetic relatedness estimates that alloparental investment by helpers increases as their relatedness to the recipients of their care increases. We conclude that kin selection has played a critical role in moulding the investment decisions of helpers in this cooperatively breeding species.
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