The role of neighbours in aggressive defence of territories in mixed-species breeding aggregations of cichlid fish
Lehtonen, Topi K.; Helanterä, Heikki (2024-11-22)
Springer
22.11.2024
Lehtonen, T.K., Helanterä, H. The role of neighbours in aggressive defence of territories in mixed-species breeding aggregations of cichlid fish. Hydrobiologia (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-024-05749-2.
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© The Author(s) 2024. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
© The Author(s) 2024. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
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Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-202411296967
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-202411296967
Tiivistelmä
Abstract
While territorial aggression is a prerequisite for reproduction in many animals, individuals need to balance its benefits against the costs. Territorial neighbours can influence these costs and benefits, yet their role is often poorly understood, especially in neighbourhoods with heterospecifics. To address this topic, we assessed both the overall (i.e. neighbourhood-level) and species-level aggression towards an intruder in naturally formed mixed-species neighbourhoods of Nicaraguan cichlid fish. We found that while the territories were tightly packed and territory holders were likely to benefit from neighbours that are aggressive towards intruders, the burden of intruder repellence fell mainly to the territory owners closest to the intruder. Moreover, the overall aggression did not markedly increase with the number of territories, further indicating that the investment by most territory holders decreased with territory density. While some species appeared better neighbours than others in terms of their contribution to the neighbourhood-level defensive aggression, the patterns of species co-occurrence did not reveal significant species pair-specific associations. Overall, these results are consistent with the selfish herd theory and suggest that territory defence against intruders can impact the composition of the local community.
While territorial aggression is a prerequisite for reproduction in many animals, individuals need to balance its benefits against the costs. Territorial neighbours can influence these costs and benefits, yet their role is often poorly understood, especially in neighbourhoods with heterospecifics. To address this topic, we assessed both the overall (i.e. neighbourhood-level) and species-level aggression towards an intruder in naturally formed mixed-species neighbourhoods of Nicaraguan cichlid fish. We found that while the territories were tightly packed and territory holders were likely to benefit from neighbours that are aggressive towards intruders, the burden of intruder repellence fell mainly to the territory owners closest to the intruder. Moreover, the overall aggression did not markedly increase with the number of territories, further indicating that the investment by most territory holders decreased with territory density. While some species appeared better neighbours than others in terms of their contribution to the neighbourhood-level defensive aggression, the patterns of species co-occurrence did not reveal significant species pair-specific associations. Overall, these results are consistent with the selfish herd theory and suggest that territory defence against intruders can impact the composition of the local community.
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