Abstract
Sex dimorphism of blastocyst developmental rates and variation of uterine development in relation to development of embryos is thought to be a potential cause of sex ratio biases in response to a multitude of environmental, physiological and psychological cues. It is argued here that it may also cause sub-binomial dispersion of the litter gender distribution in polytocous mammals, a phenomenon previously unexplained by mechanisms working after conception. To evaluate the range of potential applicability of the hypothesis, knowledge of male-female differences in developmental rates of blastocysts in animals other than laboratory mice, cattle, and swine is highly desirable. Furthermore, factors affecting the sex ratio would need to be related to embryo-uterine synchronisation in order to assess the potential explanatory value of the developmental asynchrony hypothesis. Several criteria are given to distinguish developmental asynchrony from other hypothetical mechanisms of sex ratio variation.
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