Animal Behavior and Reproduction

This study investigates genetic and environmental factors driving urban phenotypic divergence in great tits using a common garden experiment, finding that genetic and individual differences explain most trait variation, while urban behavioral differences are more plastic.

This study shows that smaller size in urban great tits is genetic, not due to food scarcity, as city and forest birds responded similarly to reduced food availability.

This study examines cloacal microbial diversity in two Jacana species, finding associations between microbial alpha diversity and testosterone and weaponry in females of one species.

This study shows that background color affects sexual behavior, growth, and mortality in Astatotilapia burtoni, suggesting potential evolutionary implications for phenotypic plasticity.

The study shows female budgerigars prefer males with foraging skills different from their own, supporting the skill-pool hypothesis in mate choice.

The paper investigates sneaky pesterer reproductive tactics in banded mongooses, finding they are rarely used as a stepping stone but instead as a backup strategy with lower reproductive success.

This study examines how mating strategies affect life history traits in the alien snail Rumina decollata, finding that self-fertilization leads to higher body weight but lower fecundity and inbreeding depression in offspring.

This study shows that increased begging effort, not reduced food intake, causes lower growth in zebra finch nestlings raised in larger broods.

The paper estimates heritability of migration traits in mule deer using GPS and genomic data, finding low heritability for migration timing, distance, and duration but high heritability for movement rate.

This study examines how direct and indirect effects influence agonistic behaviors in house crickets, showing varying impacts on aggression initiation and stridulation traits.

This study shows Aedes aegypti females use multiple conspecific cues to assess competition for oviposition sites, with attraction to low-density cues and avoidance at high densities.

This study examines how parasitism affects sex allocation in hermaphroditic barnacles, finding that parasite infestation reduces reproductive investment and shifts sex allocation towards males in heavily infested hosts.

The paper describes agonistic behavioral sequences in wild slender mudskippers, finding that larger individuals win more often and winners display more aggressive behaviors than losers.

The paper examines how parental care affects the relationship between early-life size, growth, and glucose metabolism in nestling barn swallows, finding that lower parental care intensifies the physiological disadvantage of being smaller.

This study investigates how microbial environments influence oviposition decisions in Drosophila melanogaster, finding that microbial cues affect fecundity and egg placement but not antimicrobial activity.

This study examines temporal copulatory patterns in female rats, finding that receptivity influences sexual bout frequency and time-outs, while mating conditions affect less-receptive females.

The paper develops statistical methods to detect social buffering effects using mixed-effects models and demonstrates their power and accuracy in empirical studies.

The paper investigates aggression differences among throat color morphs in Aegean wall lizards in their natural habitat and finds that the white morph exhibits more aggression than orange and yellow morphs.

The paper tests neophobia in Eisenia fetida worms, identifying bold and shy behavioral profiles that may explain their invasive success.

The paper investigates whether habitat type-specific chemical fingerprints in fire salamander larvae predict adult mate preference by comparing chemical compositions in different aquatic habitats.

The paper identifies genomic regions and genes associated with Reed Warbler responses to Cuckoo brood parasitism across Europe using landscape genomics methods.

The paper examines how increased yolk testosterone affects DNA methylation and phenotypes in wild great tit nestlings, finding sex-specific methylation changes at 763 CpG sites linked to growth, oxidative stress, and reproduction.

This study shows that in male mice, competition amplifies the impact of early life contingency, leading to divergent life trajectories, while this effect is absent in females.

This study develops an agent-based model to explore how costs of acquiring private and social information influence dispersal strategies in butterflies across stable and variable environments.

This study examines how socio-ecological factors influence sexual selection and mating strategies in Drosophila prolongata, showing context-dependent shifts in competition modes and trait significance.

This study shows that genetic rescue effectiveness depends on rescuer sexual selection background, but its benefits decline over generations in Red Flour Beetle populations.

The paper examines challenges in reaction norm predictions for wild populations, focusing on errors-in-variables, reference value uncertainty, and validation difficulties, and proposes a validation method using split data and prediction error analysis.

The paper tests for heritable genetic variation in male mate choice for large females in Drosophila melanogaster and finds additive genetic variation in both pre- and post-copulatory components.

This study identifies genetic, natal, and spatial factors influencing social behaviors in wild great tits, finding small genetic effects and significant non-genetic influences.

The study investigates male mate choice in Bradysia coprophila, finding males prefer females that produce male offspring despite genetic differences, suggesting possible misperception or female concealment of sex-determining traits.