The Cape Verdean islands form a distinct aquatic freshwater ecoregion characterized mainly by temporal water bodies with an adapted invertebrate community. Freshwater fish were not previously recorded from the archipelago. During a non-exhaustive survey of freshwater bodies on five islands of the archipelago, the first presence of a freshwater fish was recorded. Using barcoding sequences, the s...

We have developed algorithms for the likelihood estimation of additive genetic models for quantitative traits on large pedigrees. The approach uses the expectation L-maximization (EM) algorithm, but avoids intensive computation. In this paper, we focus on extensions of previous work to the case of multivariate data. We exemplify the approach by analyses of bivariate data on a four-generation, 9...

Social network theory is used to elicit details of the social structure of a population of free-ranging guppies, Poecilia reticulata. They were found to have a complex and highly structured social network, which exhibited characteristics consistent with the 'small world' phenomenon. Stable partner associations between individuals were observed, a finding that fulfils the basic prerequisite for ...

Many fishes are able to jump out of the water and launch themselves into the air. Such behavior has been connected with prey capture, migration and predator avoidance. We found that jumping behavior of the guppy Poecilia reticulata is not associated with any of the above. The fish jump spontaneously, without being triggered by overt sensory cues, is not migratory and does not attempt to capture...

A common evolutionary response to predation pressure is increased investment in reproduction, ultimately resulting in a fast life history. Theory and comparative studies suggest that short-lived organisms invest less in defence against parasites than those that are longer lived (the pace of life hypothesis). Combining these tenets of evolutionary theory leads to the specific, untested predictio...

Male harassment of females to gain mating opportunities is a consequence of an evolutionary conflict of interest between the sexes over reproduction and is common among sexually reproducing species. Male Trinidadian guppies Poecilia reticulata spend a large proportion of their time harassing females for copulations and their presence in female social groups has been shown to disrupt female-fema...