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Portrait of Henrik Smith. Photo.

Henrik Smith

Professor

Portrait of Henrik Smith. Photo.

Heritability of tarsus length in cross-fostered European Starling broods

Author

  • Henrik G. Smith

Summary, in English

A cross-fostering experiment demonstrated that tarsus length of European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) was heritable. The tarsus length of the foster-parent had no effect. A full-sib resemblance analysis showed that sibs were much more similar in tarsus length than explained by heritability alone. This was partly due to an effect of female mating status on offspring tarsus length. When nestling growth was retarded in secondary females' nests due to reduced male assistance, the increased environmental variation in tarsus length masked the heritability.

Department/s

  • Centre for Environmental and Climate Science (CEC)
  • Biodiversity
  • Biodiversity and Conservation Science

Publishing year

1993

Language

English

Pages

318-322

Publication/Series

Heredity

Volume

71

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Macmillan

Topic

  • Zoology
  • Ecology

Keywords

  • cross-fostering
  • ecological genetics

Status

Published

Research group

  • Biodiversity and Conservation Science

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1365-2540