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Offspring genetic diversity increases fitness of female Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar)

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Abstract

Inbreeding has negative effects on individual and population performances. Therefore, enhancement of offspring genetic diversity is believed to play a major role in shaping mating systems. However, no study has clearly separated the direct effect of having multiple partners from the indirect effect of having more outbred offspring on the resulting reproductive success of individuals in the wild. In this study, we report significant associations between both multiple mating and within-individual genetic diversity of offspring, and an increased reproductive success of wild female Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar. Specifically, we found that females with a higher number of mates also have more outbred offspring (within-individuals), and that both of these characteristics increased their reproductive success expressed in terms of offspring surviving when combining all freshwater juvenile stages. Our findings also indicate that determinants of fitness are different among sexes as within-individual offspring genetic diversity was not a strong predictor of male reproductive success, while the number of mates was important. We also show that females mated with more outbred males than on average, which potentially increased their chances of producing outbred offspring. These results therefore suggest that there could be more important indirect genetic benefits of multiple mating for females than for males.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Drs Mart Gross and Mark Abrahams and three anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on the manuscript. We also thank A. Boivin, S. Martin and L. Papillon for field and laboratory assistance. Funding was provided to L.B. by an NSERC Discovery grant, and to J.J.D., L.B. and other members of Centre Interuniversitaire de Recherche sur le Saumon Atlantique (CIRSA) by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) (Collaborative Special Projects), the Fondation de la Faune du Québec, the Government of Québec, the Government of Canada (Economic development) and the financial partners of the Corporation de soutien aux initiatives de recherche sur le saumon Atlantique (CIRSA). During editing of this paper, D.G. was supported by funding from an NSERC postdoctoral fellowship. This study is a contribution to the research program of CIRSA. The experiments conducted comply with current Canadian laws.

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  1. Dany Garant

    Present address: Edward Grey Institute, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3PS, UK

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département de Biologie, Université Laval, Laval, QC, G1K 7P4, Canada

    Dany Garant, Julian J. Dodson & Louis Bernatchez

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  1. Dany Garant
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  2. Julian J. Dodson
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  3. Louis Bernatchez
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Correspondence to Dany Garant.

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Communicated by M. Abrahams

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Garant, D., Dodson, J.J. & Bernatchez, L. Offspring genetic diversity increases fitness of female Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar). Behav Ecol Sociobiol 57, 240–244 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-004-0854-x

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