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Reproductive success in the barn owl is linked to partner compatibility in glucocorticoid levels

View ORCID ProfilePaul Béziers, Lukas Jenni, View ORCID ProfileAlexandre Roulin, Bettina Almasi
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/517227
Paul Béziers
1Swiss Ornithological Institute, Sempach, Switzerland
2Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
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Lukas Jenni
1Swiss Ornithological Institute, Sempach, Switzerland
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Alexandre Roulin
2Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
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Bettina Almasi
1Swiss Ornithological Institute, Sempach, Switzerland
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Abstract

In biparental species, reproductive success depends not only on the quality of the parents, the care they each provide and many environmental factors such as territory quality and food availability, but also on the ability of the parents to collaborate and divide reproductive tasks. Because hormones, such as corticosterone (CORT), modulate physiological and behavioural functions that are associated to reproductive success, hormonal compatibility between pair members is likely to have consequences on reproductive success. Here, we investigated in the barn owl (Tyto alba) whether baseline and stress-induced CORT levels are correlated between breeding partners and whether this correlation is associated to fitness parameters (i.e., clutch size, offspring number and body mass). We found that the combination of CORT levels in the two partners predicts reproductive parameters. Pairs with similar baseline CORT levels during incubation produced more fledglings than pairs with dissimilar baseline CORT levels. On the other hand, pairs showing dissimilar stress-induced CORT responses during the period of offspring rearing produced more fledglings than pairs with similar stress-induced responses. Offspring body mass was associated only with maternal (baseline and stress-induced) CORT levels and depended on the context with baseline CORT being potentially adjusted to environmental conditions but also to the energetic demand of reproduction. Hence, to produce large broods good quality mothers might increase their baseline CORT to meet the energetic demand of the brood, while mothers in unfavourable habitats may have smaller broods but still need to increase baseline CORT to cope with the environmental challenges. Taken together, the results show that the association between parental CORT levels and reproductive success are context-dependent and rely on the combination of parental CORT levels. Assuming that CORT levels reflect investment in parental care, our study suggests that parents coordinate their reproductive activities in a complex way to ensure a high reproductive success.

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The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-ND 4.0 International license.
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Posted January 18, 2019.
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Reproductive success in the barn owl is linked to partner compatibility in glucocorticoid levels
Paul Béziers, Lukas Jenni, Alexandre Roulin, Bettina Almasi
bioRxiv 517227; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/517227
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Reproductive success in the barn owl is linked to partner compatibility in glucocorticoid levels
Paul Béziers, Lukas Jenni, Alexandre Roulin, Bettina Almasi
bioRxiv 517227; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/517227

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