The role of nest-building activity in gonadotropin secretions and the reproductive success of ring doves (Streptopelia risoria).

1982 ◽  
Vol 96 (2) ◽  
pp. 307-324 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mei-fang Cheng ◽  
Jacques Balthazart
1976 ◽  
Vol 54 (9) ◽  
pp. 1409-1422 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. R. Liley

Female ring doves held under long (16 h per day) or short (8 h per day) photoperiods were treated daily for 15 days with saline, estrogen, or progesterone, alone or in combination. Seven days after the start of hormone therapy females were placed with reproductively active males for 4 h per day for 9 days. There was no difference in egg-laying, courtship, and nest-building by control birds under the two photoregimes.Ovarian follicles remained small in all birds receiving hormone treatment. Oviducts of birds receiving progesterone alone remained small in the short-photoperiod group, but at long photoperiods oviducts became enlarged. Estrogen stimulated oviduct growth at both photoperiods. The combined hormone treatment resulted in considerably greater oviduct development than estrogen alone, and in this case the oviducts of birds under long photoperiod were significantly heavier than those of short-photoperiod birds.Female soliciting and nest-building activity remained low in progesterone-treated females under short photoperiod, but increased rapidly under long photoperiod. Birds treated with estrogen and estrogen and progesterone performed considerable soliciting and nest-building. There was a marked tendency for birds under long-photoperiod conditions to be more active in nest-oriented behaviour. Copulatory behaviour by the female (begging and sexual crouch) occurred infrequently in all hormone-treated birds.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luca G. Hahn ◽  
Rebecca Hooper ◽  
Guillam E. McIvor ◽  
Alex Thornton

Animals create diverse structures, both individually and cooperatively, using materials from their environment. One striking example are the nests birds build for reproduction, which protect the offspring from external stressors such as predators and temperature, promoting reproductive success. To construct a nest successfully, birds need to make various decisions, for example regarding the nest material and their time budgets. To date, research has focused mainly on species where one sex is primarily responsible for building the nest. In contrast, the cooperative strategies of monogamous species in which both sexes contribute to nest building are poorly understood. Here we investigated the role of both sexes in nest building and fitness correlates of behaviour in wild, monogamous jackdaw pairs (Corvus monedula). We show that both partners contributed to nest building and behaved similarly, with females and males present in the nest box for a comparable duration and transporting material to the nest equally often. However, while females spent more time constructing the nest, males tended to invest more time in vigilance, potentially as a means of coping with competition for nest cavities. These findings suggest a moderate degree of division of labour, which may facilitate cooperation. Moreover, some aspects of behaviour were related to proxies of reproductive success (lay date and egg volume). Females that contributed relatively more to bringing material laid earlier clutches and pairs that spent less time together in the nest box had larger eggs. Thus, selection pressures may act on how nest building pairs spend their time and cooperatively divide the labour. We conclude that cooperative nest building in birds could be associated with monogamy and obligate biparental care, and provides a vital but relatively untapped context through which to study the evolution of cooperation.


1969 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
JUDITH M. STERN ◽  
D. S. LEHRMAN

SUMMARY The effectiveness of progesterone (100 μg./day, × 7) in inducing incubation behaviour in male ring doves is markedly diminished by castration. Priming with testosterone propionate (200 μg./day, × 14) restored the effectiveness of progesterone in eliciting this behaviour to the levels in intact males. The synergistic relationship of these two hormones with regard to incubation behaviour contrasts with the inhibition by progesterone of an androgen-dependent male courtship display, the bowing-coo. The behavioural changes observed after these endocrine treatments are fully consistent with the normal sequence of changes in behaviour characterizing the transition from the courtship phase to the incubation phase of the reproductive cycle.


Behaviour ◽  
1973 ◽  
Vol 45 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 12-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carl J. Erickson ◽  
Marie Christine Martinez-Vargas

AbstractTwo experiments were performed to evaluate some of the controlling factors in ring dove nest-building behaviour. In the first study six pairs of animals were observed each day until the first egg appeared. Behaviour was recorded during four intervals on each day in order to obtain estimates of diurnal changes in behaviour. Moreover, each pair was presented with a variety of nest-building materials in order to determine those kinds that would be most acceptable to the animals in subsequent studies. The birds showed striking diurnal changes in behaviour. Bow-cooing, aggressive pecking by the male, nest soliciting, time-in-the-nest, and allopreening exhibited a steady decline throughout the day. Nest-building activity reached a peak between one and seven hours after the lights came on in the morning and then declined throughout the remainder of the day. By contrast, copulatory behaviour, though infrequent in the morning hours, rose sharply in the late afternoon and reached a peak during the evening watch. Feeding and self-preening also increased slightly during the afternoon and evening. The ring doves also showed marked preferences in their choice of nest materials. Light-colored reed was preferred almost exclusively to dark-colored reed. Moreover, as nest construction progressed, there was a change in the type of material collected. During early building approximately equal numbers of pine needles as well as light and heavy reed were collected. As the nest neared completion, reed collection diminished and pine needles alone were collected. The resulting structure consisted of a base of several materials lined with pine needles alone. Observations in this first experiment suggested that gathering activity by the male was elicited by the presence of the female in the nest site. A second experiment was designed to examine this relationship. Twelve female ring doves were injected with progesterone and diethylstilboestrol while another twelve females served as oil-injected controls. Hormone-treated females were found to become more firmly established at the nest site during the first two days after introduction to a male. The males mated with these hormone-treated females engaged in more nest material gathering than did males mated with oil-treated females. It was concluded that gathering behaviour by the male is determined, at least in part, by relevant social cues from the female.


Behaviour ◽  
1993 ◽  
Vol 126 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 97-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sechi Mori

Abstract1) The breeding succes of three-spined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus L., forma leiura) males in a small stream of the Tsuya River, Gifu Prefecture, Central Japan, was studied with reference to timing of nesting initiation, use of space for nesting and social interactions. The observations were made almost daily during March to early July 1988 along the shore at a distance of 1-2 m from the fish and nests. 2) All the males in an enclosed study pool were individually marked (99 males). Furthermore, a total of 67 females were marked and observed weekly. The males were individually observed and their agonistic, courtship and parental behaviour as well as their reproductive success were quantified. Reproductive success of individual male was measured as the number of nests built, the number of successful nests, the number of hatched fry per nest. Nest sites were categorized in six types (A-F) on the basis of the proportion of vegetation cover around the nest and distance from the shore. 3) Body size and environmental factors (water temperature, water depth, changes in water level) were not correlated with reproductive success. Flooding was not a major cause of unsuccessful nesting. The brightness of nuptial colouration at the onset of breeding correlated significantly with individual success. Individual variation in the development of secondary sexual characteristics such as a nuptial colouration may have an important consequence for the lifetime reproductive success of the individuals. There was no relationship between fish density and reproductive success. 4) All males that nested more than once had begun breeding early in the season. The sooner a male started nest-building, the more opportunities he had to complete breeding cycles. 5) After an unsuccessful nest, males were significantly more likely to move their nest sites than after a successful nest. The subsequent nesting cycle was not always successful. 6) There was variation in nest-sitc location. The spatial pattern of nest distribution was strongly related to the temporal pattern, because the first males which settled, more often built their nests at sites along the shore where the nest was covered on one or two sides by vegetation. The location of nest site was significantly correlated with reproductive success. When males nested in partly concealed places along the shore, they could sometimes obtain a high reproductive success irrespective of the date of breeding initiation. Thus, reproductive success was largely determined by the timing of nest-building and nest position.


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