Post-hatching parental care behaviour and hormonal status in a precocial bird

Mathieu Boos, Cedric Zimmer, Aurelie Carriere, Jean-Patrice Robin, Odile Petit*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

In birds, the link between parental care behaviour and prolactin release during incubation persists after hatching in altricial birds, but has never been precisely studied during the whole rearing period in precocial species, such as ducks. The present study aims to understand how changes in parental care after hatching are related to circulating prolactin levels in mallard hens rearing ducklings. Blood was sampled in hens over at least 13 post-hatching weeks and the behaviour of the hens and the ducklings was recorded daily until fledging. Contacts between hens and the ducklings, leadership of the ducklings and gathering of them steadily decreased over post-hatching time. Conversely, resting, preening and agonistic behaviour of hens towards ducklings increased. Plasma prolactin concentrations remained at high levels after hatching and then fell after week 6 when body mass and structural size of the young were close to those of the hen. Parental care behaviour declined linearly with brood age, showed a disruption of the hen-brood bond at week 6 post-hatching and was related to prolactin concentration according to a sigmoid function. Our results suggest that a definite threshold in circulating prolactin is necessary to promote and/or to maintain post-hatching parental care in ducks. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)206-214
Number of pages9
JournalBehavioural Processes
Volume76
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Nov 2007

Keywords

  • prolactin
  • hen-brood bond
  • post-hatching period
  • Anatidae
  • PROLACTIN SECRETION
  • ANAS-PLATYRHYNCHOS
  • BROOD SIZE
  • INCUBATION
  • SEX
  • RESPONSES
  • MALLARDS
  • PENGUIN
  • DUCK
  • LH

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