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Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta)

BACKGROUND: Males that are successful in intra-sexual competition are often assumed to be of superior quality. In the mating system of most salmonid species, intensive dominance fights are common and the winners monopolise most mates and sire most offspring. We drew a random sample of mature male br...

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Autores principales: Jacob, Alain, Nusslé, Sébastien, Britschgi, Adrian, Evanno, Guillaume, Müller, Rudolf, Wedekind, Claus
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2007
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2222247/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17974038
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-7-207
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author Jacob, Alain
Nusslé, Sébastien
Britschgi, Adrian
Evanno, Guillaume
Müller, Rudolf
Wedekind, Claus
author_facet Jacob, Alain
Nusslé, Sébastien
Britschgi, Adrian
Evanno, Guillaume
Müller, Rudolf
Wedekind, Claus
author_sort Jacob, Alain
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Males that are successful in intra-sexual competition are often assumed to be of superior quality. In the mating system of most salmonid species, intensive dominance fights are common and the winners monopolise most mates and sire most offspring. We drew a random sample of mature male brown trout (Salmo trutta) from two wild populations and determined their dominance hierarchy or traits linked to dominance. The fish were then stripped and their sperm was used for in vitro fertilisations in two full-factorial breeding designs. We recorded embryo viability until hatching in both experiments, and juvenile survival during 20 months after release into a natural streamlet in the second experiment. Since offspring of brown trout get only genes from their fathers, we used offspring survival as a quality measure to test (i) whether males differ in their genetic quality, and if so, (ii) whether dominance or traits linked to dominance reveal 'good genes'. RESULTS: We found significant additive genetic variance on embryo survival, i.e. males differed in their genetic quality. Older, heavier and larger males were more successful in intra-sexual selection. However, neither dominance nor dominance indicators like body length, weight or age were significantly linked to genetic quality measured as embryo or juvenile survival. CONCLUSION: We found no evidence that females can improve their offspring's genetic viability by mating with large and dominant males. If there still were advantages of mating with dominant males, they may be linked to non-genetic benefits or to genetic advantages that are context dependent and therefore possibly not revealed under our experimental conditions – even if we found significant additive genetic variation for embryo viability under such conditions.
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spelling pubmed-22222472008-02-01 Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta) Jacob, Alain Nusslé, Sébastien Britschgi, Adrian Evanno, Guillaume Müller, Rudolf Wedekind, Claus BMC Evol Biol Research Article BACKGROUND: Males that are successful in intra-sexual competition are often assumed to be of superior quality. In the mating system of most salmonid species, intensive dominance fights are common and the winners monopolise most mates and sire most offspring. We drew a random sample of mature male brown trout (Salmo trutta) from two wild populations and determined their dominance hierarchy or traits linked to dominance. The fish were then stripped and their sperm was used for in vitro fertilisations in two full-factorial breeding designs. We recorded embryo viability until hatching in both experiments, and juvenile survival during 20 months after release into a natural streamlet in the second experiment. Since offspring of brown trout get only genes from their fathers, we used offspring survival as a quality measure to test (i) whether males differ in their genetic quality, and if so, (ii) whether dominance or traits linked to dominance reveal 'good genes'. RESULTS: We found significant additive genetic variance on embryo survival, i.e. males differed in their genetic quality. Older, heavier and larger males were more successful in intra-sexual selection. However, neither dominance nor dominance indicators like body length, weight or age were significantly linked to genetic quality measured as embryo or juvenile survival. CONCLUSION: We found no evidence that females can improve their offspring's genetic viability by mating with large and dominant males. If there still were advantages of mating with dominant males, they may be linked to non-genetic benefits or to genetic advantages that are context dependent and therefore possibly not revealed under our experimental conditions – even if we found significant additive genetic variation for embryo viability under such conditions. BioMed Central 2007-11-01 /pmc/articles/PMC2222247/ /pubmed/17974038 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-7-207 Text en Copyright © 2007 Jacob et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Jacob, Alain
Nusslé, Sébastien
Britschgi, Adrian
Evanno, Guillaume
Müller, Rudolf
Wedekind, Claus
Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta)
title Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta)
title_full Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta)
title_fullStr Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta)
title_full_unstemmed Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta)
title_short Male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (Salmo trutta)
title_sort male dominance linked to size and age, but not to 'good genes' in brown trout (salmo trutta)
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2222247/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17974038
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-7-207
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