[Babase] male disperse dates

Susan Alberts alberts at duke.edu
Thu Mar 16 15:06:34 EST 2006


Thanks Leah.

Regarding error type number 1 and 2 below, see my comments below each 
of your comments:

>There are a couple of types of conversion errors that come up with 
>the matured, ranked and disperse dates for males. There are only 7 
>errors in total but I think we should make the rules very clear.
>
>*1*. Error if there is a disperse date but no matured date
>
>There are 3 individuals who have a disperse date but no matured 
>date. Susan's documentation for "on" and "by" dates states:
>
>   1. *The male is a natal male from one of our study groups but he
>      disperses before attaining one or both markers, and attains one or
>      both markers in a non-study group.* We follow these rules:
>         1. If he emigrates before testicular enlargement and is known
>            to be living in a non-study group and we have no other
>            information about him, we assign him a matured "BY" date
>            that is is 6 years 8 months afer his birth. Again, the point
>            here is to allow us to (somewhat coarsely) designate the
>            subadults in the population at any given time. This also
>            provides a "BY" date if comes back into a study group after
>            he has attained the marker.
>
>Is this a rule that has been followed in the past? If so, then we 
>should estimate matured dates for PES, HIC, and SEB using this 
>method. All 3 are natal males.


I am not sure that this rule has been followed in the past. I think 
that we might need to abandon it. The thing is that a young male 
really can disperse without achieving matured or ranked (although 
this is not common) and in those cases we may never know his matured 
or ranked if we never see him again. It would not be accurate to give 
him a ranked and mature BY date on the date he disperses, but it 
would be aritificial to make one up several years later, especially 
if we never see him again. In short, I think that dispersed is a 
different kind of maturational marker than ranked or matured. The 
latter two are inevitable physical processes that occur in a certain 
sequence, the former is not. We probably shouldn't have this 
restriction on it.

>
>*2*. Error if there is a ranked date but no matured date
>
>There are 4 individuals with a ranked by date but no matured date. 
>All of these are recent ranked "by" dates. Susan's documentation 
>states that:
>
>         1. If the male enters as an adult (field notes indicate adult)
>            OR he immediately starts winning fights with other adult
>            males, he gets a "BY" date for RANKED but /not/ for MATURED
>            - he gets no entry at all in the MATUREDATES table.
>
>I think, at least recently, we were giving individuals a matured by 
>date that was the same as the ranked by date. However, Karl's 
>documentation states that there must be a matured date if there is a 
>ranked date. Which rule do we want?
>

Leah, i believe you are right that the rule in my documentation 
sheet, as originally written, is different from what we decided and 
are doing now. I think that if there is a ranked date there must be a 
matured date, as stated in the rule in Karl's documentation.  We want 
to retain karls' rule. If the ranked is a by date, the matured date 
can be the same. If the ranked is an on date, the mature date can be 
a by date but equal to the ranked date. Can you change the lab 
documentation to reflect this?

let me know if there are questions.

Thanks,
Susan
-- 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Susan Alberts, Department of Biology, Duke University, Box 90338, 
Durham NC 27708
919-660-7272 (phone), 919-660-7293 (FAX)


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