Externally fertilizing fish provide several fascinating examples of cryptic female choice at work. In these systems, females lay their eggs in nests on the floor
In some of the more simplistic cases of cryptic female choice, females prove unable to discern a good mate from a bad one during pre-coital
The parenting hypothesis posits that first-time moms (moms who haven’t given birth) will allonurse unrelated offspring as a means by which to gain experience and
The fire salamander Salamandra salamandra is an organism with a perplexing level of parental plasticity. Females are generally oviviparous (not to be confused with oviparous),
Close bonds form between females who see each other all the time, although in the case of alloparenting and shared nursing between house mice, there
If the scene for heterospecific copulation was that of a horror film, the scene for hybridization is more like that of science fiction. In nature
Toothed whales called Odontocetes are mammals that form close social bonds, most often along matriarchal lines, and it is therefore not surprising that an infant’s
While many human parents will assure their children they do not have a favourite, in the animal kingdom, moms may provide different levels of care
Among the most supported hypotheses for milk sharing between females is the kin selection hypothesis. This states that mothers are more likely to share these
