Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Identifier

6766

Date

2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science

Major

Biology

Committee Member

Emerson Keith Bowers

Committee Member

James Adelman

Committee Member

Michael Ferkin

Abstract

Rearing conditions have sex-specific effects on offspring which can influence the unequal production of sons and daughters according to environmental conditions. Particularly in species in which males a re larger and more expensive to produce. In such species, high-quality mothers are expected to over-repoduce sons. Such conditions arise in the Carolina wren, a species in which sexual size dimorphism manifests prior to independence and maternal fitness is influenced by environmental conditions, thereby favoring the unequal production of sons and daughters. However, high-quality daughters can have greater reproductive value than sons. Therefore, high-quality mothers might over-rpoduce daughters because daughters will inherit heightened parental care, thereby enhancing the fitness of a given female's grandoffspring. I investigated the heritable traits associated with fitness and parental care in a wild population of Carolina wrens and related these traits to offspring rations. The results found suggest the production of sons and daughters is seldom random.

Comments

Data is provided by the student.

Library Comment

Dissertation or thesis originally submitted to the local University of Memphis Electronic Theses & dissertation (ETD) Repository.

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