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BIOL 150 > Behavioural Ecology > Flashcards

Behavioural Ecology Flashcards

1
Q

Four questions

A

Proximate cause: how a behaviour occurs (morphological and physiological mechanisms)
- mechanism: what stimulus causes the behaviour?
- ontogeny: how does an individuals reaction or response to the stimulus change over its lifetime?

Ultimate cause: why a behaviour occurs/why natural selection has favoured a behaviour
- adaptive value: what about the behaviour increases an individual’s fitness (helps it survive and reproduce)?
- phylogeny: what is the evolutionary history of the behaviour?

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2
Q

Behaviour

A

Action (stimulus-response) that alters the relationship between an organism and its environment
- stimulus may be external ( e.g. vervet monkey alarm)
- stimulus may be internal (hunger pains)

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3
Q

Innate behaviour

A
  • inherited or inborn
  • inflexible (i.e. not affected by learning or environmental conditions)
  • stimulus triggers response automatically
  • do not need be to taught these behaviours
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4
Q

Instinctual behaviour

A
  • inborn/inherited
  • inflexible (independent of environmental conditions)
  • more complex than innate
  • e.g. wildebeest calves stand ad walk immediately after birth
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5
Q

Condition dependent behaviour

A

flexible in response to environmental conditions/change response to environmental cue (i.e. spiny lobsters hide more when there are more predators)
- cost benefit analysis in behaviour (energetic, risk, & opportunity cost)

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6
Q

Learned behaviour

A

Changes in response to learning; learning is a change in behaviour that results from a specific experience in the life of an individual (e.g. grizzly bears teach clubs to fish)

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7
Q

Behaviour type matrix

A

Learnability (down) and condition dependence (right)

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8
Q

Genetic predisposition

A

A genetic characteristic which influences the possible phenotypic development of an individual organism within a species/population under the influence of environmental conditions

  • rover allele (high population density)
  • sitter allele (low population density/resource abundant; expends less energy)
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9
Q

Foraging behaviour

A

Depends on distance travelled
- min. cost of finding/ingesting food and risk of predation
- max. usebale energy then in
- farther away increases risk of predation

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10
Q

Darwinian fitness

A

Measure of the reproductive success (contribution to the next generation); has 3 components:

  1. Survival or mortality selection
  2. Mating success or sexual selection
  3. Family size or fecundity selection
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11
Q

Sexual dimorphism

A

Refers to phenotypic difference between males and females; in many cases dimorphisms cannot be explained by viability selection (selection of individual organisms who can survive until able to reproduce)

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12
Q

Sexual selection

A

Differential reproductive success resulting from differential abilities to find a mate; undergo different selective pressures

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13
Q

Parental investment

A

The energy, time, and resources devoted to mating, gestating, and caring for offspring; parental investment usually much greater for females; eggs are expensive and sperm is cheap

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14
Q

Daily energetic investment in gametes (m vs. f)

A
  • daily female egg productions requires 3x the energy needed for daily basal metabolism
  • daily male sperm production requires 4/1000 of the energy needed for daily basal metabolism
  • eggs require more energy than sperm
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15
Q

Asymmetric limits on reproductive potential

A

Males have much greater variance in reproductive success than females (can produce an infinite quantity of sperm); but success is limited by the number of mates they can obtain

  • male reproductive success diminishes with age; females does not
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16
Q

Intrasexual selection

A

Interactions between members of the same sex

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17
Q

Intersexual selection

A

Interactions between members of opposite sexes

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18
Q

“Male-male” competition: combat

A
  • Intrasexual section is male-male combat can favour morphological traits (i.e. large body size, armour, antlers etc.)
  • the greater the potential for reproductive success (variance) the greater the competition for mates
  • when reproductive variance is greater for females, it will favour competitive traits
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19
Q

“Male-male” competition: infanticide

A

Male kills off other males young since nursing females are not able to breed

20
Q

Estrus

A

Recurring period of sexual receptivity

21
Q

Cues for mating

A

Males and females synchronize; reproduction synchronizes with food availability and predation risk

Seasonal cues: Day length triggers hormonal change in spring; phonology: study of seasonal timings in life cycle events

Social cues

22
Q

Synchronizing

A
  • widest selection of possible mates
  • timed to coincide with abundance of resources
  • timed to coincide with favourable weather
  • cues result in resources when they’re most available
23
Q

Female choice

A

Females have opportunity to choose which mate they want to mate with (will pick male that has the traits she is looking for)
- most fit; passes on to offspring
- mating calls, colours etc. proves how they acquired resources

24
Q

HOW female chooses (female choice)

A
  • good genes hypothesis: male ability to pass on genes that will increase survival/reproductive success of her offspring
  • sexy sons hypothesis: male whose genes will produce male offspring with best chance of reproductive success
  • sometimes random
25
Q

Polygyny

A

Males mating with 2 or more females

26
Q

Polyandry

A

Females mating with 2 or more males; males contribute significantly to parental care

27
Q

Classic polyandry

A

Female has multiple males in the brood that each tend their own clutch

28
Q

Cooperative polyandry

A

All males contribute to the parental care of a single clutch; some may not be his offspring but some are so he cares for them all

29
Q

Diel migration

A

Move between 2 geographic regions daily (day and night); trade off between predator avoidance and food

30
Q

Seasonal migration

A

Rainy vs. dry season; summer vs. winter

31
Q

Navigation (migration)

A
  • Piloting: familiar landmarks memorized
  • compass orientationL ability to identify direction N,E,S,W (i.e. sun/stars, magnetic field, currents)
  • true navigation: ability to locate a specific place on Earth’s surface
32
Q

Why migrate? (risks & benefit)

A

RISKS:
- energy expenditure
- predation risk
- time not reproducing

BENEFITS:
- exploit temporarily available resources (food)
- access habitat only seasonally accessible
- avoid cyclic hazards (e.g. mosquitos and caribou)
- take advantage of different habitat during different life cycle stages

33
Q

Migration

A

The intentional, directional often cyclic movement of a population between two regions, usually associated with a cyclic change in the environment

34
Q

Dispersal

A

The movement of individuals in a population, typically from the area of birth to a new location (one way trip)

35
Q

Communication

A

A social process in which a signal from one individual modifies the behaviour of another individual
- the stimulus is a signal and evokes a response in another individual; no response means no communication

36
Q

Mimicry

A

Mimic colouration of another species to avoid predation; lying only works when it’s uncommon (i.e. lures)

37
Q

Mimic males

A

Why aren’t all males mimics? Frequency-dependent selection.
- the mimic male will be more successful; will pass on genes and have offspring; but becomes too common then less effective (back-and-forth)

38
Q

Altruism

A

Behaviour with a direct fitness cost to he individual carrying out the behaviour and a direct fitness benefit to the recipient (i.e. self-sacrifice); is rare
i.e. alarm calls (ground squirrels), worker casts (protect queen bee), food sharing (wild dogs)

39
Q

Kin selection

A

Pass down your genetic info by producing offspring or by helping your relatives produce more offspring

  • if benefits of altruistic behaviour are high, the benefits are dispersed to close relatives who likely also possess the trait for altruism
  • if costs are low, alleles associated with altruistic behaviour will be favoured by natural selection
40
Q

Hamilton’s Rule

A

If Br>C, then altruism is favoured by natural selection (look at example pg. 143)

B = the fitness benefit to the beneficiary
r = the coefficient of relatedness
C = the fitness cost to the actor

41
Q

Hamilton’s rule: direct fitness

A

Derived from your own offspring (your own specific contribution to the next generation)

42
Q

Hamilton’s rule: indirect fitness

A

Derived from helping relatives have more offspring than they could otherwise (contribution to relatives)
- affected by kin selection
- helping individuals in family increases chances of passing on genetics

43
Q

Inclusive fitness

A

Direct + indirect fitness

44
Q

Calculating coefficients of relatedness

A

rBC = sum of(rBA X rAC) (A, B, C are subscripts)

a) half siblings: r = 1/4
b) full siblings: r = 1/2
c) cousins: r = 1/8 (0.125)

45
Q

Reciprocal altruism

A

An exchange of fitness benefit that are separated over time; not necessarily due to relatedness (may receive help in the fitter from non-kin)

46
Q

Haploid

A

haploid male develops from unfertilized egg (no father but has grandfather); diploid female develops from mating of haploid female and diploid male

  • diploid sisters: r = 0.75
  • relatedness of diploid females to offspring: r = 0.5

BIOL 150 (4 decks)

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