Data from: Clever mothers balance time and effort in parental care – a study on free-ranging dogs

Mammalian offspring require parental care, at least in the form of nursing during their early development. While mothers need to invest considerable time and energy in ensuring the survival of their current offspring, they also need to optimize their investment in one batch of offspring in order to ensure future reproduction and hence lifetime reproductive success. Free-ranging dogs live in small social groups, mate promiscuously, and lack the cooperative breeding biology of other group living canids. They face high early life mortality, which in turn reduces fitness benefits of the mother from a batch of pups. We carried out a field based study on free-ranging dogs in India to understand the nature of maternal care. Our analysis reveals that mothers reduce investment in energy intensive active care and increase passive care as the pups grow older, thereby keeping overall levels of care more or less constant over pup age. Using the patterns of mother-pup interactions, we define the different phases of maternal care behaviour.

哺乳动物幼崽需要亲代抚育，在发育早期至少需要以哺乳形式提供的照料。尽管母兽需要投入大量时间与精力以保障当前幼崽的存活，但同时也需优化对单窝幼崽的资源投入，从而保障未来的繁殖能力，最终实现终身繁殖成功率的最大化。自由漫游犬（Free-ranging dogs）以小型社会群体形式聚居，实行混杂交配，且缺乏其他群居犬科动物所具备的合作育幼生物学特性。这类犬群面临极高的早期幼崽死亡率，这会进而降低母兽从单窝幼崽中获得的适合度收益。本研究针对印度境内的自由漫游犬开展野外实地调查，以解析母代抚育行为的本质特征。分析结果显示，随着幼崽逐渐成长，母兽会减少高能耗主动照料的投入，同时增加被动照料的比例，从而使整体照料强度随幼崽年龄增长基本维持稳定。本研究基于母幼互动模式，对母代抚育行为的不同阶段进行了明确界定。