Female tree swallows (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Tachycineta bicolor</Emphasis>) increase offspring heterozygosity through extrapair mating |
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Authors: | Mary K Stapleton Oddmund Kleven Jan T Lifjeld Raleigh J Robertson |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Biology, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, K7L 3N6, Canada;(2) Department of Zoology, Natural History Museum, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1172 Blindern, 0318 Oslo, Norway |
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Abstract: | Recent attention has focused on genetic compatibility as an adaptive function for why females engage in extrapair mating.
We tested the genetic compatibility hypothesis in tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) over five breeding seasons using data from ten microsatellite loci. Tree swallows are socially monogamous passerines exhibiting
high levels of extrapair paternity. Overall, we found that 47% of offspring were the result of extrapair fertilizations, and
83% of females produced at least one extrapair offspring. Consistently for all years, extrapair offspring were more heterozygous
than their maternal half-siblings, which is in accordance with the genetic compatibility hypothesis. The difference was largely
caused by the high heterozygosity of extrapair offspring sired by unknown males, suggesting that females are engaging in extrapair
copulations with geographically distant males to increase the likelihood of being inseminated by a more compatible mate. Our
findings support the idea that postcopulatory mechanisms are important for females when assessing potential sires for their
offspring. |
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Keywords: | Tree swallows Genetic similarity Extrapair mating Extrapair paternity Tachycineta bicolor Heterozygosity Genetic compatibility Genetic diversity Microsatellites |
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