North American barn swallows pair, mate, and interact assortatively

While female mate choice is well established, mutual choice may play a larger role in mate selection than currently recognized. Assortative mating is a common form of non-random mating in animals that can result from mutual choice. However, few studies address assortative patterns beyond the social pair, potentially overlooking assortativity in the mating pair and in the social environment that shapes reproductive decisions. We asked whether North American barn swallows (Hirundo rustica erythrogaster) breeding in a large colony form pairs, mate (through both within-pair and extra-pair fertilizations), and interact assortatively by ventral plumage color, wing length, and age. Social interactions were tracked using proximity loggers, which recorded close contact between tagged individuals when birds were mating and laying eggs. Barn swallows paired and mated assortatively by their ventral plumage color; however, the assortative patterns in mating pairs were not as strong as they were in s..., , # Data from: North American barn swallows pair, mate, and interact assortatively

Dataset DOI: [10.5061/dryad.1g1jwsv8g](10.5061/dryad.1g1jwsv8g)

## Description of the data and file structure

This dataset contains pairing, mating, and social interaction data for Morosse et al. 2025 Behavioral Ecology, a study on assortative behavior in North American barn swallows. In all cases, NA means there is missing data.

2022 3d edgelist MF.csv: Edgelist of male-female social interactions

2022 3d edgelist updated 10_30_23.csv: Edgelist of all social interactions

FemaleWPEPcolorcompariso 08_07_24.csv: Datafile for comparing male plumage color between a female's social and extra-pair (EP) mates

OH Dulog 2022 6_7_24 pruned.csv: Attribute file for birds in social network

OH Dulog 2022 6_11_24 pruned for MF.csv: Attribute file for birds in the male-female social network

SG color long 7_18_24.csv: Long format plumage color data for density plots

SGMatingairs 08_07_24 final.csv: Mating pairs for...,