Female “dispersal” in hamadryas baboons

Transfer among social units in a multilevel society

Bibliographic Data

ID8318917
AuthorsLarissa Swedell (0000-0001-6909-2669, Queens College, CUNY, corresponding author), Julian Saunders (University of Cape Town), Amy Schreier, Amy L Schreier (0000-0002-0379-3750, Duke University), Brittany Davis (0000-0001-9145-2632), Brittany A Davis (Cardiff University), Teklu Tesfaye, Mathew Pines
Year2011
Volume145
Issue3
Pages360-370
Publication date2011-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Journal of Physical Anthropology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0002-9483 • E-ISSN: 1096-8644
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1002/ajpa.21504
PMID21469076
OpenAlexW1995426207
LanguageEN
Citations received30
References cited94

Unlike most cercopithecines, hamadryas baboons ( Papio hamadryas hamadryas ) are characterized by female‐biased dispersal. To clarify this pattern within the context of their hierarchical social system (comprising one‐male units, clans, bands, and troops), we report here 7 years of data on female transfers among social units in wild hamadryas baboons in Ethiopia. Female tenure in one‐male units (OMUs) ranged from 1 to 2,556 days ( N = 208) and survival analysis revealed a median tenure length of 1,217 days (40 months). Changes in OMU membership consisted almost exclusively of takeovers by males, not voluntary transfer. Of 130 takeovers, 67% occurred within the band and 33% across bands, and, of the 22 takeovers for which we have clan membership data, 77% occurred within, not between, clans. These results reinforce the notion that hamadryas female dispersal is not analogous to sex‐biased dispersal in other taxa, because (1) at least in Ethiopian populations, females do not disperse voluntarily but are transferred, often forcibly, by males; (2) only dispersal between bands will promote gene flow, whereas females are most often rearranged within bands; (3) hamadryas females undergo social dispersal but not usually locational dispersal; and (4) while male hamadryas are far more philopatric than females, they have been observed to disperse. It thus appears that the ancestral baboon pattern of female philopatry and male dispersal has evolved into a system in which neither sex is motivated to disperse, but females are forcibly transferred by males, leading to female‐mediated gene flow, and males more rarely disperse to find females. Am J Phys Anthropol, 2011. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc

Biological dispersal · Biology · Clan · Philopatry · Population · Sociology · Zoology · Animal Behavior and Reproduction · Animal Vocal Communication and Behavior · Demography · Ecology · Primate Behavior and Ecology

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub