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One 'absolutely prolific' male bird is keeping his species alive in the U.K. (www.cbc.ca)
submitted 3 days ago by to c/news@hexbear.net
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o7

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[–] 8 points 3 days ago* (1 child)

Good for him!

But uh. I think that presents problems for the following generations.

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  • [–] 18 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 child)

    What's nifty about sexual reproduction is that the male and female halves of the chromosomes get halved and randomly allocated in the next generation. The first generation will be half genes from the single male, but the next generation will only be 1/4, and so on. The gene pool is truly shared between males and females of the species, it's not like every subsequent member will be half genes from the one male.

    This is actually what makes sexual reproduction worth the hassle. It allows for rapid recovery from major genetic bottlenecks like this, which are more common than you might think.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 days ago (1 child)

    But the next generation will all be reproducing with siblings, and the next generation will all be reproducing with cousins.

    My understanding is that this will result in basically unpredictable recessive traits becoming dominant in the population.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

    The genetic bottleneck scenario you're describing is a "last man on earth" scenario.

    AU (the male Montagu's Harrier the article is about) is not the last male of his species, he's just the only male currently migrating to the UK to breed. There are plenty of Montagu's Harriers breeding across the European continent and plenty of unrelated females seeking male Harriers in the UK.

    The offspring will have 50% of AU's DNA, but they will almost certainly not be reproducing with their nestmates.

    Also, sex determination in birds is different than in therian mammals. As a male, AU has two Z chromosomes to pass on and his daughters will get their W chromosomes from their mothers, which means that this population will be more genetically diverse than one would expect based on human genetics.

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