Costs of and Investment in Mate-Guarding in Wild Long-Tailed Macaques (Macaca fascicularis): Influences of Female Characteristics and Male-Female Social Bonds.

Cédric Girard-Buttoz,Panji Ahmad Fauzan,Erdiansyah Rahmi,Muhammad Agil,Michael Heistermann,Antje Engelhardt

doi:10.1007/s10764-014-9775-3

Abstract

Male primates living in multimale groups tend to direct mate and mate-guarding choices toward females of high reproductive value, i.e., high-ranking, parous females, or females with which they share strong bonds. Little is known, however, about the constraints that may limit male mate-guarding choices (the costs of this behavior) and the influence of the females’ quality on male investment in mate-guarding. We aimed to study the effects of female rank, parity status, and male–female social bond strength on the costs of and investment in mate-guarding by males. We carried out our study during two reproductive seasons on three groups of wild long-tailed macaques in Indonesia. We combined behavioral observations on male locomotion and activity with noninvasive measurements of fecal glucocorticoids (fGC). Males spent less time feeding when mate-guarding nulliparous females than when mate-guarding parous females and tended to have higher fGC levels when mate-guarding low-ranking nulliparous females than when mate-guarding high-ranking nulliparous ones. Evolution should thus favor male choice for high-ranking parous females because such a decision brings benefits at proximate (reduced costs of mate-guarding) and ultimate (higher reproductive value) levels. Further, male investment in mate-guarding was flexible and contingent on female reproductive and social value. Males were more vigilant and more aggressive toward other males when mate-guarding females to which they were strongly bonded and/or high-ranking ones than when mate-guarding other females. Our findings bring a new dimension to the study of mate choice by showing that males not only mate preferentially with high-quality females but may also aim to secure paternity with these females through optimized monopolization.

Highlights

Studies of mate choice traditionally focus on females because these are usually the sex that invests the most into reproduction and, should be more selective in regard to their mating partners (Andersson 1994; Trivers 1972)
We focused on three groups: Camp (C), Ketambe Bawa (KB), and Ketambe Atas (KA)
Whereas males spent more time on mate-guarding parous than nulliparous females in two groups (C and KA), the opposite occurred in the third group (KB) (Table I)

Summary

Introduction

Studies of mate choice traditionally focus on females because these are usually the sex that invests the most into reproduction and, should be more selective in regard to their mating partners (Andersson 1994; Trivers 1972). Males of several species have been observed to concentrate their mating effort on females during their conceptive cycles, e.g., chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii: Emery Thompson and Wrangham 2008) and chacma baboons (Papio hamadryas ursinus: Weingrill et al 2003) and to preferentially mate with high-ranking females, e.g., Barbary macaques (Macaca sylvanus: Kuester and Paul 1996) and long-tailed macaques (M. fascicularis: Berenstain and Wade 1983; de Ruiter et al 1994) These females produce offspring of better quality than low-ranking females, i.e., offspring more likely to survive until adulthood and to achieve a high rank position in the future (Majolo et al 2012; Robbins et al 2011; Setchell et al 2002; van Noordwijk and van Schaik 1999, 2001). In some species, males exhibit mating preferences toward females with which they have strong social bonds, independently of female rank, parity, or fertility status, e.g., rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta: Chapais 1983), Japanese macaques (M. fuscata: Takahata 1982), and savannah baboons (Smuts 1985)

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