Colorful facial markings are associated with foraging rates and affiliative relationships in a wild group-living cichlid fish.

Autor:	Culbert BM; Department of Integrative Biology, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, Canada., Barnett JB; Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada., Ligocki IY; Department of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA.; Department of Biology, Millersville University, Millersville, PA, USA., Salena MG; Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada., Wong MYL; School of Earth, Atmospheric and Life Sciences, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia., Hamilton IM; Department of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA.; Department of Mathematics, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA., Balshine S; Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
Jazyk:	angličtina
Zdroj:	Current zoology [Curr Zool] 2022 Dec 22; Vol. 70 (1), pp. 70-78. Date of Electronic Publication: 2022 Dec 22 (Print Publication: 2024).
DOI:	10.1093/cz/zoac100
Abstrakt:	Many animals use color to signal their quality and/or behavioral motivations. Colorful signals have been well studied in the contexts of competition and mate choice; however, the role of these signals in nonsexual, affiliative relationships is not as well understood. Here, we used wild social groups of the cichlid fish Neolamprologus pulcher to investigate whether the size of a brightly colored facial patch was related to 1) individual quality, 2) social dominance, and/or 3) affiliative relationships. Individuals with larger patches spent more time foraging and tended to perform more aggressive acts against conspecific territory intruders. We did not find any evidence that the size of these yellow patches was related to social rank or body size, but dominant males tended to have larger patches than dominant females. Additionally, patch size had a rank-specific relationship with the number of affiliative interactions that individuals engaged in. Dominant males with large patches received fewer affiliative acts from their groupmates compared to dominant males with small patches. However, subordinates with large patches tended to receive more affiliative acts from their groupmates while performing fewer affiliative acts themselves. Taken together, our results suggest that patch size reflects interindividual variation in foraging effort in this cichlid fish and offer some of the first evidence that colorful signals may shape affiliative relationships within wild social groups. Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing interests. (© The Author(s) 2022. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Editorial Office, Current Zoology.)
Databáze:	MEDLINE
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