Living in mixed-sex groups limits sexual selection in coloration and pelage appendages in bovids

Among mammals, bovids provide some of the most striking examples of sexual dimorphism in colouration and pelage appendages, such as beards and manes. This dimorphism is usually assumed to have evolved through sexual selection on males in the context of intra- or intersexual communication. However, the sexes look similar in several bovid species thought to be characterized by large opportunities for sexual selection, hinting at fitness costs of dimorphic traits due to other selection pressures. This study applies the comparative method with phylogenetic control to identify the factors promoting and constraining the evolution of dimorphism in colouration and pelage appendages across bovids. We found that trait dimorphism correlated positively with large breeding group size, an indicator of the intensity of sexual selection, and negatively with male territoriality, which is also likely to affect the operation of sexual selection. The relative rarity of colour and pelage dimorphism in speci..., Data on colouration sexual dimorphism (CSD) and pelage appendage sexual dimorphism (PASD) were collected for 110 species in the family Bovidae. The scores for CSD and PASD were obtained by visual scoring of images from males and females of each species (range 2-8 pictures per species) obtained from: www.arkive.com; www.encyclopediaoflife.com; www.ultimateungulate.com; Costello JR. (2016). Bovids of the world. Princeton (USA): Princeton University Press. All pictures referred to the same subspecies. 
CSD was scored on eight distinct body regions: (i) head; (ii) neck; (iii) flank, shoulder, humerus; (iv) rump, femur; (v) upper front leg; (vi) lower front leg; (vii) upper hind leg; and (viii) lower hind leg. CSD for each body region was scored according to a three-point scale: 0 - no difference; 1 - the difference in background colour or contrast markings (i.e. presence in one sex only); 2 - the difference in both background colour and contrast markings. Background hair colour was compared..., , # Living in mixed-sex groups limits sexual selection in coloration and pelage appendages in bovids

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.w0vt4b8tb](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.w0vt4b8tb)

**Recommended citation for this dataset:** D'Ammando, Giacomo; Franks, Daniel; Bro-Jorgensen, Jakob (2024), Living in mixed-sex groups limits sexual selection in coloration and pelage appendages in bovids, Dryad, Dataset.

## Description of the data and file structure

#### Sexual\_Dimorphism\_Bovids\_DAmmando.csv

CSV file containing data on colour sexual dimorphism (CSD), pelage appendage sexual dimorphism (PASD), average breeding group size, male mating strategy (territorial vs non-territorial), degree of sexual aggregation, and habitat openness for 110 species of the family Bovidae.

Variables:

* Species = Bovid species as indicated by scientific name (genus + species)
* CSD = Colour Sexual Dimorphism, scored visually by comparison of male/female pictures of each species, with the aid of a colour ...