Summary: Behav Ecol Sociobiol (2005) 57:566­574
DOI 10.1007/s00265-004-0899-x
O R I G I N A L A R T I C L E
Aneil F. Agrawal · Nicole Combs · Edmund D. Brodie
Insights into the costs of complex maternal care behavior
in the burrower bug (Sehirus cinctus)
Received: 9 March 2004 / Revised: 2 December 2004 / Accepted: 3 December 2004 / Published online: 13 January 2005
Springer-Verlag 2005
Abstract The evolution of life history characters, in-
cluding parental care behaviors, depends on costs and
benefits. When offspring can influence parental behav-
iors, parent-offspring conflict over parental care can oc-
cur, but only if these parental behaviors are costly.
Mother burrower bugs (Sehirus cinctus) exhibit extended
and complex care of offspring. Mothers guard eggs until
hatching and then attend and provision offspring for ap-
proximately 2 weeks after hatching. Using four experi-
mental treatments, we attempted to identify the costs as-
sociated with specific components of these behaviors.
Under laboratory conditions, egg guarding increases inter-

Source: Agrawal, Aneil F. - Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Toronto
Brodie III, Edmund D. - Department of Biology, University of Virginia

Collections: Environmental Sciences and Ecology