Transgenerational maternal age effects in nature: Lessons learnt from Asian elephants

Abstract

In Focus: Reichert, S., Berger, V., Jackson, J., Chapman, S. N., Htut, W., Mar, K. U., & Lummaa, V. (2019). Maternal age at birth shapes offspring life-history trajectory across generations in long-lived Asian elephants. Journal of Animal Ecology, 89, 996–1007. Parental age can have strong effects on offspring life history, but the prevalence and magnitude of such effects in natural populations remain poorly understood. Using a multigenerational dataset of semi-captive Asian elephants, Reichert et al. (2019) studied the effects of maternal and grandmaternal age on offspring performance and found that offspring from old mothers have lower survival, but higher body condition and reproductive success than offspring from younger mothers. Importantly the observed consequences on survival are long-lasting and span more than one generation, with grand-offspring of old grandmothers also showing reduced survival. These findings suggest that persistent transgenerational effects of maternal age on fitness can shape the individual variation in ageing patterns in nature and ultimately the evolution of life histories.