Lecture 1- Optimal Foraging and Evolutionary Stable Strategies

Question 1

what are tinbergen’s 4 questions

Answer 1

ultimate:
-adaptation- how does the behaviour affect fitness?
-phylogeny- how did a behaviour evolve?
proximate:
-mechanism- what causes the behaviour to be performed?
-development- how does the behaviour develop within the lifetime of an organism?

Question 2

models that can be used for predicting fitness

Answer 2

cost-benefit model- can look at where cost is low and benefit is high and predict behaviour from this

Question 3

phenotypic gambit

Answer 3

looking at phenotype/behaviour, and inferring fitness from this without considering genetics

Question 4

how do cost and benefit change differently?

Answer 4

there is diminishing returns on benefits, and a linear increase in cos

Question 5

example of multiple costs needing to be minimised

Answer 5

bird foraging- need to keep search costs low by hunting bigger things, and handling costs low by hunting smaller things- this leads to a midpoint

Question 6

marginal value theory- uses

Answer 6

can be used to predict time spent searching one patch, giving up time, giving up density

Question 7

marginal value theory- plot

Answer 7

looks at transit and forage times, against cumulative energy intake, to find the optimal time to be spent in a patch.
you identify the transit time, and draw a tangent from this to the gain curve- this gets an optimal foraging time

Question 8

where else can MVT be applied?

Answer 8

mate investment- can look at eggs fertilised rather than resource intake, and the distance is for mates not food, and time for copulating rather than foraging

Question 9

what is identical free distribution

Answer 9

a way in which populations distribute between patches of resources- assumed to be evenly spread out-ish

Question 10

what is game theory in the context of behaviour?

Answer 10

modelling of behavioural outcomes, e.g. looking at how interaction decisions are made

Question 11

‘tit for tat’ behaviour

Answer 11

starting off cooperating, then defecting if the other defects, which allows opponent fitness to be minimised

Question 12

‘hawk vs dove’

Answer 12

idea that behaviour can be more aggressive or more peaceful, can then model when you would be likely to see each behaviour within a pop

Question 13

evolutionarily stable strategy

Answer 13

strategy that can’t be invaded by other strategies, similar to the economic concept of the ‘Nash equilibrium’

Question 14

example of a stable strategy using hawks and doves

Answer 14

5/9 hawk, 4/9 dove- all either is not stable