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Offspring sex ratio in relation to parental structural size and body condition in the long-lived wandering albatross (Diomedea exulans)

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Abstract

Sex ratio theory is one of the most controversial topics in evolutionary ecology. Many deviations from an equal production of males and females are reported in the literature, but few patterns appear to hold across species or populations. There is clearly a need to identify fitness effects of sex ratio variation. We studied this aspect in a population of a long-lived seabird, the wandering albatross (Diomedea exulans), using molecular sex-identification techniques. We report that parental traits affect both (1) fledgling traits in a sex-dependent way and (2) chick sex: Sons are overproduced when likely to be large at fledging and, to a lesser extent, daughters are overproduced when likely to be in good body condition at fledging. Because for the same population, a previous study reported that post-fledging survival was positively affected by size in males and by body condition in females, our results suggest that wandering albatrosses manipulate offspring sex to increase post-fledging survival.

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Acknowledgement

Frédéric Pawlowski, Amélie Robert, Jérôme Legrand and Caroline Dondelinger provided invaluable technical assistance in the field. We thank Dominique Besson for help with the data management and D. Allainé, C. Barbraud, S. Devillard, B. Doligez, M. Festa-Bianchet, J.-M. Gaillard, M. Garel, A. Loison, A. Million, J. O’Brien, B. van Moorter and two anonymous referees for helpful comments on the manuscript. The study was financed by IPEV (Institut Polaire Français—Paul Emile Victor—program no. 109) and the Ethic Committee of IPEV approved the field procedure.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Évolutive, Université Lyon 1, 69622, Villeurbanne Cedex, France

    Pierrick Blanchard

  2. Laboratoire de Physiologie Intégrative, Cellulaire et Moléculaire, Université Lyon 1, 69622, Villeurbanne Cedex, France

    Nicolas Hanuise

  3. Centre d’Études Biologiques de Chizé, 79360, Villiers en Bois, France

    Pierrick Blanchard, Stéphanie Dano & Henri Weimerskirch

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  1. Pierrick Blanchard
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  2. Nicolas Hanuise
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  3. Stéphanie Dano
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  4. Henri Weimerskirch
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Correspondence to Pierrick Blanchard.

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Communicated by I. Hartley

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Blanchard, P., Hanuise, N., Dano, S. et al. Offspring sex ratio in relation to parental structural size and body condition in the long-lived wandering albatross (Diomedea exulans). Behav Ecol Sociobiol 61, 767–773 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-006-0307-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-006-0307-9

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