Abstract
Territoriality entails demanding social interactions with competing individuals, typically males. Variation in quality of males can be predicted to affect the spatial arrangement of territories. We present a model aimed at understanding the spatial properties of territories on leks, where the presence of a hierarchy in a population of males leads to the clustering of individuals around high-ranking ‘hotshot’ males. The hierarchy results in a decrease in the number of nearest neighbors interacting directly with high-ranking males, with potential socio-sexual benefits for such males.
Highlights
Territoriality entails demanding social interactions with competing individuals, typically males
For individuals of equal ‘strength’ initially positioned at random, the spatiotemporal dynamics emerging from this behavioral rule leads to a spatial arrangement of territories where the mean and modal value of the frequency distribution of the number of nearest neighbors is 6 and the modal size of territories is equal to the mean space available per individual
The spatiotemporal dynamics of the population is entirely governed by two parameters: the fraction φ of low-ranking males with respect to the entire population, and the relative weight ρ = wLR/wHR of low-ranking males with respect to the high-ranking ones
Summary
Territoriality entails demanding social interactions with competing individuals, typically males. For individuals of equal ‘strength’ initially positioned at random, the spatiotemporal dynamics emerging from this behavioral rule leads to a spatial arrangement of territories where the mean and modal value of the frequency distribution of the number of nearest neighbors is 6 and the modal size of territories is equal to the mean space available per individual. The predictions from this model have been confirmed by observations on fish and birds[3,7]. Females cannot typically be coerced to copulate, and the frequency of copulations represents a reliable clue to gauge the rank of individual males inside the lek as determined by female mate preference
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