ArticleRoyal Society open science2025
Patterns of paternity: insights into mating competition and gene flow in a recovering population of humpback whales.
Article in Royal Society open science, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed.
- Longer rorqual whale mothers produce more female offspring.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Patterns of paternity: insights into mating competition and gene flow in a recovering population of humpback whales.Royal Society open science · 2025Article
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Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
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Abstract
Variation in reproductive success is a fundamental prerequisite for sexual selection to act upon a trait. Assessing such variation is crucial in understanding a species' mating system and offers insights into population growth. Parentage analyses in cetaceans are rare, and the underlying forces of sexual selection acting on their mating behaviours remain poorly understood. Here, we combined 25 years of photo-identification and genetic data to assess patterns of male reproductive success and reproductive autonomy of the New Caledonian (Oceania, South Pacific) humpback whale breeding population. Paternity analysis of 177 mother-offspring pairs and 936 males revealed low variation in male reproductive success (average 1.17 offspring per father) relative to other polygynous species. The observed skew in success was higher than expected under random mating and skewed overall towards males (93%) without evidence of paternity over the study period. Finally, an updated male gametic mark-recapture abundance estimate of 2084 (95% confidence interval = 1761-2407, 1995-2019) fell between previous census estimates of the New Caledonian population and the wider Oceanian metapopulation. Our results provide critical insights into the mating competition of male humpback whales and population dynamics across Oceanian populations, two important factors affecting the slow recovery from whaling across the South Pacific region.
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