title: Male siblings inhibit reproductive activity in female pine voles, Microtus pinetorum.
abstract: Pine vole females paired in breeding cages with male siblings remain unreproductive beyond the age of puberty onset. In this study only 10% of females caged with their brothers reproduced, whereas 85% of females placed with strange males had litters. Mating between a female and a strange male was also suppressed by the presence of a male sibling sequestered behind a wire mesh barrier in the breeding cage. When the sibling male was removed from the cage after 1 day, 78% of the females produced litters. When the sibling remained behind the barrier in the breeding cage, only 42% gave birth to young conceived in his presence. Conception of second litters during the postpartum estrus occurred in over 80% of females caged with strange males alone and only 10% of females caged with sibling males. Female pine voles are induced to become reproductively active by strange males but this activity is depressed by the presence of a brother, and once initiated it does not continue if the female is caged with her brother.
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003411:Arvicolinae / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D011247:Pregnancy; D012098:Reproduction; D012726:Sexual Behavior, Animal; D012801:Sibling Relations