The spread of exclusive mating in a chacma baboon population

Abstract

Mating has progressively tended toward pair bonding in a chacma baboon (Papio cynocephalus ursinus) population during eight years of study. Both males and females have been mating with a smaller and smaller percentage of the potential mates available to them. Troop subdivision during the dry winter in the absence of predation was the original cause of mating limitation, but most members of winter subtroops only rarely mated with adults who had not belonged to the same winter subtroop during the summers as well. Following reintroduction of potential predation, both subtroop size and frequency decreased, but mating did not become less exclusive.