Kin recognition and cannibalism in polyphenic salamanders

Kin-selected siblicide and cannibalism in the European earwig

Aggression levels among individuals can severely increase under high density or shortage of crucial resources, sometimes resulting in individuals killing conspecifics. This is not uncommon in family groups of diverse taxa, where the dependent offspring compete for the limited resources provided by their parents. Killing a nest mate can relax the level of competition, and cannibalism provides a ...

Kin recognition in rattlesnakes.

Snakes are often regarded as the least social of all vertebrate groups, but this assumption stems from the fact that they are secretive and difficult to observe in nature, rather than direct evidence. Recent studies have revealed a surprising degree of social complexity in snakes. Here, I examine the ability of captive-raised timber rattlesnakes (Crotalus horridus) to recognize siblings by meas...

Kin recognition in plants?

Larval marbled salamanders, Ambystoma opacum, eat their kin

The effect of kinship on larval cannibalism was examined in the marbled salamander. In separate behavioural trials, cannibalistic larvae were presented with two smaller conspecifics (a ‘prey group’), matched for size, that were (1) siblings of the cannibal, (2) non-siblings and (3) one sibling and one non-sibling (i.e. a mixture of two sibling groups); larvae were allowed to consume only one co...

Social Learning and Kin Recognition

A s Sherman (this issue) notes, I tried (Alexander 1990) to determine “the extent to which social learning, especially without self-reference, can account for the kin recognition findings of different investigators with different organisms . . . (p. 273). I had two motivations. First, I have had difftculty modeling the evolution of kin recognition via mechanisms that can function in the absence...