Abstract
Compensatory social behavior in nonhuman animals following maternal loss has been documented, but understanding of how orphans allocate bonding to reconstruct their social networks is limited. Successful social integration may be critical to survival and reproduction for highly social species and, therefore, may be tied to population persistence. We examined the social partners involved in affiliative interactions of female orphans and non-orphans in an elephant population in Samburu, northern Kenya that experienced heightened adult mortality driven by drought and intense ivory poaching. We contrasted partners across different competitive contexts to gain insight to the influence of resource availability on social interactions. Though the number of partners did not differ between orphans and non-orphans, their types of social partners did. Orphans interacted with sisters and matriarchs less while feeding than did non-orphans, but otherwise their affiliates were similar. While resting under spatially concentrated shade, orphans had markedly less access to mature adults but affiliated instead with sisters, bulls, and age mates. Orphan propensity to strengthen bonds with non-dominant animals appears to offer routes to social integration following maternal loss, but lack of interaction with adult females suggests orphans may experience decreased resource access and associated fitness costs in this matriarchal society.
Highlights
Strong mother-offspring bonds are widespread in philopatric species[1]
We followed the social behavior of orphan and non-orphan female elephants in the Samburu population in northern Kenya following drought and during a persistent period of poaching[22,26], testing the prediction that orphans shift allocation of bonding effort to maternal relatives
We discuss the implications of our results for long term orphan social integration and elephant population recovery
Summary
Strong mother-offspring bonds are widespread in philopatric species[1]. The importance of these bonds is demonstrated by the adverse consequences documented for orphans across species, including lower life expectancy[2,3], decreased physical condition[4,5], and stunted vocal behavior[6]. Offspring survival in baboons[7] and horses[8] is tied to the social relationships of mothers The absence of those social relationships may be expected to have detrimental effects on orphans, especially for species highly dependent on social bonds[2,9,10]. Of orphans to remain socially integrated following maternal loss Because of their decades-long reliance on their mothers and the relationship of maternal loss to the current ivory poaching crisis[26,27], elephants provide a highly relevant wild system in which to investigate orphan bonding patterns. We followed the social behavior of orphan and non-orphan female elephants in the Samburu population in northern Kenya following drought and during a persistent period of poaching[22,26], testing the prediction that orphans shift allocation of bonding effort to maternal relatives. We discuss the implications of our results for long term orphan social integration and elephant population recovery
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