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.哺乳动物幼崽均需亲代抚育，在发育早期阶段至少需要通过哺乳获取照料。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，但同时也需优化对每胎幼崽的资源投入，以此保障未来的繁殖能力，进而实现终生繁殖成功。散养犬（free-ranging dog）以小型社会群体聚居，实行无固定配偶的混杂交配，且缺乏其他群居犬科动物所具备的合作繁殖特性。该物种幼崽早期死亡率极高，这会降低母兽通过一胎幼崽所能获得的进化适合度收益。本研究针对印度境内的散养犬开展了野外实地调查，以解析母育行为的本质特征。分析结果显示，随着幼崽成长，母兽会减少高能量消耗的主动抚育投入，同时增加被动抚育的比例，最终使整体抚育水平在幼崽的整个发育阶段中基本保持稳定。研究团队基于母幼互动模式，明确划分了母育行为的不同阶段。